Some of you may have heard my mini-rant on Hoopsville and I thought it was bringing to the blog Basically, I was trying to offer some (unsolicited) advice to those on the administrative site of things, with the purpose of making tournament week more enjoyable for fans (and even us media members) across the country. The three suggestions I made…

1. Update your Web site

To prep for Hoopsville today, I surfed to more than a dozen different team Web sites in the New England region. A couple didn’t have their season stats listed. One that did (and I won’t indict) had the 2004-05 campaign as the most updated version. Those that follow the games like to know as much about teams as possible. Since print/radio/tv coverage is usually very limited, a team Web site is the next-best place to go. Keeping those sites updated will keep your fans, and other Division III fans across the country rather happy.

2. Check your warm-up mix tape

This was one I wanted to write last season and didn’t. I went to at least 4 different sites last season in which I heard warm-up music containing either racial slurs or profanity. I’m all in favor of free speech, but it’s important to remember that these games are family entertainment. The demographic of attendees for championship week includes a younger crowd (parents are more likely to take little kids) and an older crowd (the grandparents turn out in droves, as I discovered at one game last year). I saw more than a few heads swivel in response to certain lyrics, and I don’t think anyones game would suffer if certain language were either bleeped or averted. The skip button the CD player can work wonders.

3. Crowd Control

I got my first look up close at a real “storm-the-court” scenario at Trinity (Conn.) last week. While those things may look cool on television, from just a few feet away, they can be rather frightening and dangerous. I’m not someone who’s into the idea of “spoiling your fun” but I’d encourage the necessary security be in place to prevent mob scenes from overrunning celebratory moments.

Ok … now that I’ve gotten that off my chest, back to the fun stuff …