Seattle watches from the sideline as Portland, Spokane earn right to host NCAA men's basketball tournament games

In three weeks, the NCAA men's basketball tournament, one of the nation's premier sporting events, will again beam a spotlight on a proud city in the Northwest.

Just not ours.

It's Spokane hosting first- and second-round NCAA games March 19 and 21, just as it was Portland doing the same last March. And just as the Rose City will again in 2012.

Seattle? The city that was once a darling in the NCAA's Final Four cycle, hosting that event three times in an 11-year period from 1984 to 1995, has been reduced to a wistful sideline spectator. Seattle hasn't hosted first and second rounds since 2004, and after two unsuccessful bids, the earliest it could host again is 2014.

Extensive interviews reflect considerable puzzlement locally, and a variety of possible reasons that seem to have welled up and relegated what was once one of the NCAA's destination sites to the background.

John David Wicker, Washington State's associate athletic director for facilities and a point man for WSU in its host role at Spokane Arena, says he doesn't know the dynamics of what's happened in Seattle, but says:

"I've been surprised Seattle hasn't been more successful getting bids on the men's side."

The University of Washington has hosted four women's volleyball regionals since 2004 and will stage women's basketball first- and second-round games for the second straight year. But the bigger fish, the first weekend of the men's tournament, is eluding Seattle.

"In my mind, we should be hosting one of these events," says Ralph Morton, executive director of the Seattle Sports Commission. "I haven't heard reasons to help me understand why not."

Experience matters

The 10-member NCAA basketball committee, composed of athletic directors and conference commissioners, awards the hosting plums on a three-year cycle now, after previously making the appointments on a two-year cycle. It announced its latest round last fall, out to 2013.

Experience helps. Or it can hurt. Each time a city acts as host, that becomes a piece of its portfolio. Everything is assessed after the fact, good and bad, from possible snafus with hotels and transportation to smoothness of operations at the arena.

One man intimately familiar with the tournament says the NCAA considers four key components: lodging, transportation, arena and the host school.

John Buller, head of previous local organizing committees here, says a successful bidder needs a solid host school for hands-on operations, a hotel community that is "hungry" and a serviceable arena and staff.

Seattle, of course, lost its Final Four capability when the Kingdome was blown up in 2000. The NCAA requires bigger buildings than KeyArena for its regionals (second weekend), so Seattle was reduced to a first- and second-round hopeful with the demise of the dome.

Seattle hosted those in 1999 and again in 2004, and it's apparent it didn't get glowing marks in '04. Nobody pinpoints a single disastrous problem here that year, but clearly, there were issues.

One pertained to signage inside KeyArena. Because of its own sponsorships, the NCAA requires standing advertisements inside an NBA arena to be covered, and it also places limits on how many times the arena sponsor's name can be visible.

"The one big thing, I think there was a personality conflict down there between one of the former guys at KeyArena ... and the NCAA," says Scott Baebler, assistant AD for facilities at the University of Washington.

Morton, who arrived in his position shortly after those games, says, "My understanding is, it was a challenge getting the things (done) that needed to be done."

There was also a ticketing snafu for one session, in which seats were allocated to the wrong school and had to be renumbered.

"That's definitely a pretty big mistake," says Baebler.

Meanwhile, there was the reality of KeyArena's relatively cramped auxiliary facilities. The Sonics' locker room was off-limits, so portable lockers had to be brought in for one of the dressing rooms.

There were other issues, seemingly small, but all adding up. Staffers had difficulty soundproofing the media-interview room to NCAA standards.

Greg Shaheen, NCAA vice president who oversees the tournament, says that in response to concern from the UW after the last unsuccessful bid, "I went through the review documents and there was literally nothing that would be disconcerting. I see no reason we couldn't return to Seattle, and I know the committee sees no reason why."

One source familiar with tournament administrators, however, says the experience was sour enough that one told him, "We're not dealing with those people again."

Shaheen says that before the past two unsuccessful bids from Seattle, the city didn't bid in three of the previous four cycles. Still, he insists that "there's nothing against Seattle at all."

"By not throwing in a bid every year, does the NCAA look at it differently?" Baebler asked rhetorically. "I don't know. They haven't told us that."

Here's another option: Take some more anger out on Clay Bennett, the owner who uprooted the Sonics to Oklahoma City. Baebler and Morton wonder whether the long feud between Bennett and the city over KeyArena's suitability to be an NBA facility sullied the arena's image, no matter whether it's fine for college basketball.

Says Morton, "Sometimes, as they say, perception can be reality."

Bidding is competitive

To the south, another hurdle looms for Seattle. For years, the NCAA denied Portland's Rose Garden any awards as long as the state continued to run its SportsAction NFL lottery game.

But three years ago, the state abandoned SportsAction and the NCAA responded quickly, not only putting the event there last March but granting Portland a second one for 2012.

Drew Mahalic, CEO of the Oregon Sports Authority, extols the pluses of Portland, calling it the "most walkable city in the country" and noting that some light-rail service is free and that Oregon doesn't have a state sales tax.

But he says, "If I were to separate what's the difference between Seattle and Portland, I would say the (basketball) facilities are of paramount importance."

KeyArena's renovation came in 1994, only a year before the Rose Garden opened. But the Portland arena's seating capacity is a couple of thousand larger, auxiliary space is much greater, and the facility has already had a $40 million update in recent years.

To the east, Spokane has lately outstripped Seattle for bids, although it came up short in the last round and must find a way to add several hundred seats to the Spokane Arena to reach a new NCAA minimum of 12,000 to continue hosting.

"They keep up with the Joneses in a building that's 11 years old," says WSU's Wicker. "The Arena is a great partner and incredibly accommodating in anything we need or the NCAA needs."

Nationally, bidding is competitive. Shaheen recalls "upwards of 80" cities seeking to host the tournament in the latest cycle. Some are eager enough that they waive certain fees like arena rental. Those can be difficult to match, especially when Seattle's bid includes somewhat higher hotel prices.

As the NCAA tournament approaches, though, none of the arguments against Seattle does much to satisfy those at the UW or local organizers. Nor does Mahalic's general observation about Portland:

"Everything seems to be a bit easier here."

Right now, that's not the case in Seattle. Getting the tournament back only seems to be getting harder.

Bud Withers: 206-464-8281 or bwithers@seattletimes.com