NCAA set to add week to schedule

After just two seasons with a uniform start date and a condensed schedule, change is coming once again to college baseball.

The NCAA Board of Directors voted Thursday to extend the regular season to 14 weeks by adding a week to the beginning of the season starting in 2010.

Opponents of the measure asked the board to add the extra week at the end of the schedule. The NCAA, however, said that wasn’t possible.

“We wanted to add the week on the front end of the schedule because that’s what our programs are familiar with from the earlier days,” NCAA Division I Vice President David Berst said. “If we had moved the week to the back end of the season, that would’ve made too much of an impact on our championship schedule.”

Many coaches have expressed support for the change, but Michigan coach Rich Maloney staunchly opposed the change.

“It will enhance the financial burden that we already to go through, because now we have to add another week to the schedule, likely on the road,” Maloney said. “Adding the week to the start of the season just shoots down the original intent of the uniform start date.”

Michigan and many other northern programs supported the uniform start date two years ago.

But now the programs in the north are back at a crossroads. With the season starting a week earlier, their home schedules won’t improve. They will continue to go south early in the season and an extra week of games means more expense.

For programs like Northern Iowa and Massachusetts – already considering dropping their programs – this could be the nail in the coffin.

“It’s really hard to make things financially feasible and to grow a fan base when we once again will never be able to play at home early in the season,” Maloney said. “We northern coaches didn’t like condensing the schedule either, so we were in full support of adding a week to the back end of the schedule.”

“With the economy the way it has been lately, I just don’t think it makes a lot of sense from a cost effectiveness standpoint to add another week of financial responsibility.”

Maloney added that in a perfect world for many northern coaches, the season would last 14 weeks and begin March 1.

LSU coach Paul Mainieri can see both sides. Mainieri coached at Notre Dame before heading to Baton Rouge, La. Like Maloney, the LSU coach would prefer to have the extra week added on the back end of the schedule. Mainieri, though, still supports the schedule change.

“I’ve got to say that I really like the uniform start date and the past changes, but now that I’ve been at LSU and have tried to go through two seasons with the condensed schedule, I’ve seen how it really taxes our players. The change is not perfect but it’s definitely another step in the right direction.”

Texas A&M’s Rob Childress is another coach that has been on both sides of the aisle in this debate. Having previously coached at Nebraska, Childress is well aware of the challenges facing teams in the northern half of the country. After all, the Huskers routinely deal with several feet of snow on the ground deep into the month of March.

But like Mainieri, Childress supports the change.

“Playing four games a week as opposed to five games a week gives coaches the ability to develop a team in a practice setting,” Childress said. “It also allows them more time in the classroom to develop as student-athletes. This was something that truly needed to happen and I think most coaches are going to appreciate the change.”

Coaches from different regions will never agree on everything when it comes to scheduling. But for once everyone can agree the NCAA heeded calls for change when the condensed schedule began to cause issues both on an off the field.

The NCAA finally listened to many coaches. And at the end of the day, that doesn’t appear to be such a bad thing.