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The opening round of the NCAA tournament isn't going anywhere. The University of Dayton will host each of the NCAA tournament's "first four" games in the expanded 68-team bracket.Dayton has hosted the NCAA's opening-round play-in game, since the inception of the 65-team field in 2001.
The games will be played Tuesday and Wednesday night following Selection Sunday.
"Dayton ... consistently attracted extraordinary crowds," Gene Smith, the chair of the Division I Men's Basketball Committee, said in a statement released by the NCAA. "The enthusiasm the (Dayton) staff and the local fans demonstrated for hosting that game did not go unnoticed, so it makes sense to us to conduct the inaugural First Four in Dayton."
Two of the four games will match the lowest seeded teams in the tournament, with the winners advancing onto the 16-seed line. The other two games will match the last four of the 37 at-large teams.
The "first four" games represent the first multi-team expansion of the NCAA tournament since the event moved to the field of 64 in 1985, and the first expansion since the tournament added a 65th team in 2001.
The NCAA announced its decision to expand to 68 teams in April after toying with a much larger expansion to as many as 96 teams. The league then announced its "first four" format in mid-July, but left the question of where and when the new opening-round games would take place.
Smith cited the history of success in Dayton as a major factor in keeping the tournament's first night in Dayton.
"We explored different options, including playing the first-round games at multiple sites as well as the possibility of playing all games on one day, but we came to the conclusion that Dayton is the best location to host all four games for the 2011 tournament," he said. "Moving forward, we will conduct a thorough evaluation, as we do with all rounds of the championship, with the student-athlete experience being our top priority."
All four games will be televised on Turner's truTV cable channel, the result of the NCAA's new 14-year, $10.8 billion television package with CBS Sports and Turner Broadcasting.
-- Ray Holloman
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