What If with the MCLA Tourament

There has been a lot of talk about the NCAA Division I tournament expanding to 18 teams this coming spring.  It is great to see the expansion.  The more teams getting the opportunity to participate the better.  At 26.7% of teams it isn't watered down with too many teams participating, it is in fact a really good number.  Jac Coyne who used to cover the MCLA for Lacrosse Magazine did a blog for Division II and Division II showing what it would look like if DII and DIII matched DI.  Read it here.

So this got us thinking.  What if the MCLA tournament did the same thing and had 26.7% of their teams participate.  Currently Division I consists of approximately 100 teams.  With 16 teams participating that means 16%.  Based on the poll right before the tournament, the 2013 field would have looked like this:

1. Colorado State
26. Buffalo

2. Colorado
25. Northeastern

3. Chapman
24.  Georgia Tech

4. Arizona State
23. Pittsburgh

5.  BYU
22. Georgia

6. UCSB
21.  Arizona

7. Sonoma State
20.  Davenport

8.  Boston College
19.  Oregon State

9.  Stanford
18. Cal Poly

10. Oregon
17. Simon Fraser

11. Michigan State
16. Minnesota-Duluth

12. Grand Canyon
15.  Connecitcut

13. California
14.  Texas

Obviously some of these matchups would have to be tweaked to avoid conference matchups, but would most definitely be interesting.  Obviously, to handle this load of games, the MCLA would have to move to a regional format.

In Division II, it would have 28 teams, and would look like this

1. St. Thomas
28.  Missouri State

2. Westminster
27. UC-San Deigo

3. St. Johns
26.  Humboldt State

4.  Liberty
25.  St. Andrews

5. Concordia
24.  Stonehill

6. US Coast Guard
23.  Siena Heights

7. Palm Beach Atlantic
22. Lindenwood-Belville

8. Sam Houston State
21. Briarcliffe

9. Grove City
20.  Dayton

10. Elon
19. Gonzaga

11. Grand Valley
18.  Portland

12. Indiana Tech
17.  SCAD

13.  North Dakota
16. Cal State Fullerton

14. Western Oregon
15.  Florida Gulf Coast

Wow.  That is a lot of MCLA games.  At this point, no change is expected in the MCLA tournament format so moving to anything more to 16 teams is not plausible.  To be honest, not sure the tournament is ready for more than 16 teams in either division.