You and Venicedog (perhaps a few more) seem to be using this line consistantly; "already won the title." Let me see if I have this straight. The coaches and the AD's of all the SEC teams have agreed there would be a regular season champion and a tournament champion. It's a system that has been in place for quite some time now...but, you've chosen to ignore that system and proclaim LSU SEC Champions no matter what happens in the tournament? There is a regular season championship and a tournament championship. To pretend/proclaim the regular season champ is the "real" champ can be taken several ways...none of which cast you in a favorable light. I don't know for sure, but I'd be willing to bet that one of the tournament titles LSU has was during a year where someone else won the regular season title.
Hmmmm, I wonder if you would feel the same way in football if LSU won the West and say Georgia won the East with a better SEC record. So Georgia would be the SEC champs and no need to have the SECCG? You can say what you want but whoever wins the SEC BB tourney will claim to be the champ and most fans will agree.
To make more money! If the auto bid wasn't tied to the tourney, no one would care about it and fans would not show up. I think most basketball fans understand that winning the regular season title is a greater accomplishment. Much harder to win over an 8 week period versus 3 or 4 days.
Reminds me of my recent conversation with my wife, "Snoopy": Snoopy: Wanna make plans for Friday night? Hawker: Steaks on the grill? Watch Iowa in the Big Ten Tourney? Snoopy: Is this important? Is this that big tourney thing you watch every year? Hawker: No, this is a pre-tourney tourney thing. Iowa's already in the big tourney tourney. Snoopy: So, why are they playing? It seems like they've been playing since July... Hawker: since November... Snoopy: Whatever... so they are playing in a tourney even though they're already in a bigger tourney? Hawker: Exactly! Snoopy: That's stupid.
Hilarious. I for one, as a die hard college hoops fan, have to agree. The "tourneys" were set up to give those teams who didn't perform well in the season the "cinderella" shot to make to the dance. It adds to the pre-tourney excitement, it adds drama, and makes the schools more $. Is it nice to win the conference tourney? Sure. But, I'd take the conference championship, using the conference "tourney" as a tune up, and doing well in the big dance, ANY DAY. I don't think educated basketball fans would say tourney champs equate to conference champs. And, I think that the football SEC championship game is somewhat different. You play the east vs. west to determine the Conference Champ. In hoops everyone plays everyone at least once, there are more games and I think that noone would argue the champ emerging with the best record has demonstrated they are the best team in the SEC. I think over time, with the NCAAs becoming the madness that it is, the conference tourneys are really there as a nice little prize at the end for perhaps the team that either (A) has something to prove, or (B) needs that cinderella shot at the dance.
