In 10 days, the 400 or so high school basketball teams in the state will start on a journey that they hope ends in Madison.

Only 20 boys and 20 girls basketball teams get to go to Madison for the WIAA state basketball tournaments. But possibly as soon as next season, the road to state looks like it won’t go to Madison, but Green Bay.

The Wisconsin State Journal reports:

The WIAA will move the state high school basketball tournaments to the Green Bay area unless the the University of Wisconsin athletic department can make the Kohl Center available in 2013 and 2014.

The decision, confirmed by WIAA executive director Dave Anderson on Thursday, inspired a top UW athletic official to accuse Anderson of waging a personal campaign to relocate the event, which brings tens of thousands of players, coaches and fans and generate about $9 million for Madison’s economy annually.

Well, that’s a great start to the last Madison state basketball tournament in who knows how long, isn’t it?

Anderson said it’s unclear if the WIAA’s contract with the UW, set to expire after the 2013 tournaments, would change if the Kohl Center is not available next year. If it is, he said the move to Green Bay would take place then.

He indicated the university had not altered its initial offer for 2013 and ’14 to play the WIAA tournaments Tuesday through Thursday. He also reiterated the WIAA is not interested in moving the basketball tournaments to the Dane County Coliseum or the UW Field House.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s version:

The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association moved a step closer toward moving its state boys and girls basketball tournaments to the Green Bay area, but at the same time dangled Madison and the University of Wisconsin one last carrot.

The Board of Control supported an executive staff recommendation to enter into a five-year deal with the Resch Center in Ashwaubenon if UW is unable to accommodate the tournaments according to the terms of the existing agreement.

The WIAA’s news release, posted Thursday night, is similarly opaque:

The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association Board of Control supported an Executive Staff recommendation to enter into a five-year agreement with PMI and the Resch Center in Green Bay, as soon as 2013 and extending through 2017, if the University of Wisconsin is unable to accommodate the State Boys and Girls Basketball Tournaments in accordance with the terms of the existing agreement.

Seeking a change in venue became necessary because of conflicts with the University of Wisconsin  athletics schedule for 2013 and beyond. The traditional weekends of the State basketball tournaments in the Kohl Center have been reserved for the Western Collegiate Hockey Association playoffs in 2013, and initially, the Big Ten Conference Hockey playoffs beginning in 2014.

Now, a time out for some history: The first state invitational basketball tournament was held at Lawrence College (now University) in Appleton in 1905. The state normal schools (think of them as the UW four year schools not called Madison) started a state tournament in 1916, which the WIAA recognizes as the first state tournament. Except for a one-year visit to Wisconsin Rapids in 1936, UW–Madison has hosted every state tournament since 1920 — first at the UW Fieldhouse, and since 1998 at the Kohl Center (except for a few state girls tournaments at the Fieldhouse and the Dane County Coliseum).

The biggest state tournaments — football, basketball, hockey, wrestling, softball and golf — are held in Madison. Track was moved from Madison to La Crosse in 1990, and soccer moved from Madison to Milwaukee in 2003. Girls volleyball is held at the Resch Center, which is where state basketball apparently is headed.

The possibility of moving state basketball out of Madison first came up because of a set of potential conflicts with the Kohl Center with Big Ten hockey, which will begin as a conference-sanctioned sport in 2013–14. The Big Ten’s original plan was to have the conference’s regular season champion host the conference tournament. That would have required Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State and Penn State to reserve their hockey facilities (the Kohl Center in UW’s case) for tournaments they may or may not host. That obviously would crowd out any other potential use, particularly, in UW’s case, basketball.

Ultimately, UW prevailed on the Big Ten to do what UW’s current hockey conference started doing in 1988 and the Big Ten should have done in the first place — hold the tournament at a neutral site. Within the Big Ten geographic footprint, there are, by my count, at least eight facilities that host either National Hockey League or American Hockey League (the top hockey minor league) facilities large enough for a proper college hockey tournament.

The problem with having your regular-season champion host your conference tournament is what happens if the host fails to make the tournament final — your favorite cable sports channel broadcasts a conference championship game, with an NCAA tournament berth at stake, in an arena with thousands of fans dressed as empty seats. As fun as it would be to have the Kohl Center host a title game, NCAA tournaments moved out of on-campus hockey arenas years ago, and Division I conference tournaments don’t belong on campus.

Beyond a few additional conflict issues, there is one big issue that the Wisconsin State Journal’s Rob Hernandez pointed out:

WIAA executive director Dave Anderson has dropped hints since this facility conflict emerged that playing the state basketball tournaments in Madison — while rich in tradition — has come, in recent years, at a steep price.

Anderson is not the only one who sees the financial elephant in the room on this debate. Witness this email I received from a Madison man who worked a Camp Randall Stadium concession stand during the WIAA state football finals:

“I was embarrassed at the $8 cost of a Coke and hot dog,” the worker wrote. “Popcorn? $3.50! This courtesy of the UW “W” Club.

“I also heard stories of cars being towed for street parking violations. I would love to see a comparison of the proposed facility expense to be charged to the WIAA by Green Bay compared to that charged by the UW Athletic Department.” …

Indeed, the cost of attending these events is not cheap.

An Internet check this week of eight downtown hotels during the upcoming state boys basketball tournament showed the cheapest rates ranging from $107 to $206 per night.

Parking costs continue to be a major issue for WIAA events.

Anderson said the cost to park in lots run by UW Transportation Services has doubled in less than five years, from $6 in 2009 to $12 this winter. The WIAA had been told last year’s hike would convert the fee from a per-session rate to an all-day pass, according to Anderson, but it was not sold that way to those of us who parked next to Goodman Diamond for the state softball tournament and might not be practical given the limited parking near the Kohl Center.

Contrast that to what reportedly has been offered by PMI Entertainment Group, which runs the Resch Center in Ashwaubenon. According to the Green Bay Press-Gazette, PMI has offered to cap parking rates at $6 (at nearby Lambeau Field) and, with the Packers, split the revenue with the WIAA while Green Bay-area hotels have guaranteed affordable rates and no required two-night stays.

Madison’s past and present mayor, Paul Soglin, begs to differ about several points of contention:

MYTH

#2. Madison hotels require a two night minimum.

REALITY 

Madison hotels are abundant and affordable.  The vast majority of hotels have not, and do not require a minimum stay. There are 25 hotels that are participating in a Fan Package that begins in 2012, offering great rates and no minimum stays. The Greater Madison Convention and Visitors Bureau has offered to assist in developing fan hotel packages in the past and is delighted that WIAA agreed to pursue that option.

 MYTH

#3 Parking costs in Madison are high.

REALITY      

Event parking rates at City of Madison and UW-Madison campus parking ramps will be in effect.  Parking in city ramps near the Kohl Center will be only $4. The University is guaranteeing their rates until 2020.  There will be free shuttles from other locations to help offset parking costs. …

MYTH

#5 Madison doesn’t care about the WIAA.

REALITY

Financial assistance and support from the University, City of Madison, Dane County, Greater Madison Convention & Visitors Bureau as well as the hotel and restaurant community are included in current proposal.  There has been an incredible collaborative effort to put together the proposal.  Madison has a long history, and continues to host many other WIAA state tournaments throughout the year.  We welcome our high school athletes and their families and fans from around the state year-round.

Madison’s parking rates are not high if you’re comparing them to Milwaukee. Madison’s parking rates are high if you’re comparing them to anywhere else in Wisconsin. (If you think east-side-campus parking is bad now, you should have been in Madison in the 1980s.) Soglin, a native of Chicago, also appears to have an interesting definition of “affordable” if that means $107 to $206 per night. And where was all this fan-affordability collaboration before now? At those prices, you might hope your team loses its first state game.

Whether the tournament is in Madison or Green Bay, the WIAA may need to rethink how it does state basketball anyway, based on people voting with their feet:

Attendance at the state boys basketball tournament has dipped greatly in the past two years and, overall, in four of the past five.

In 2011, the first year of the five-division state tournament, total attendance fell to 73,094. That was 12,359 fewer than 2010, the last year of four-division play with one extra session, and the first time attendance fell below 80,000 since 1990 — the last year of a three-division format.

It’s been the same with the state wrestling tournament, which has seen a decline in the past four years, dropping from 66,206 — an all-time high — in 2007 to 60,902 last year.

The switch from four to five divisions took away the Thursday morning session, so an attendance drop isn’t surprising. But if you’re concerned about dipping attendance, playing two fewer games won’t improve attendance. Moving state from Madison to Green Bay won’t improve one, shall we say, delicate issue that has been the case ever since I’ve been paying attention to state: Milwaukee teams don’t draw well at state. (For related but converse reasons, the chance of state basketball in Milwaukee is approximately zero.)

One improvement with moving state from Madison to Green Bay might be in atmosphere. The UW Fieldhouse can best be improved with a wrecking ball, but the atmosphere of a full Fieldhouse was great once you maneuvered around the buckets picking up melting snow from the leaking roof. The Kohl Center has all the amenities fans could ask for, but at 17,000 capacity it is not remotely close to full for state games, particularly state girls games. (Back in the 1990s, UW briefly considered putting in grass at Camp Randall Stadium, which would have forced the state football championship games to go elsewhere, or at least most of them. The flip side to that is that having your football stadium one-eighth full for a state title game doesn’t really make for great atmosphere either.)

The WIAA’s share of blame for dipping attendance goes back to the regular season and the WIAA’s current apparent policy of arranging conferences by their schools’ enrollment instead of by geography. Three of Ripon’s six Eastern Valley Conference opponents — Freedom, Waupaca and Clintonville — are one hour or more away from Ripon by car or bus. The WIAA always swings between geography and enrollment in deciding conference lineups, but enrollment affects football much more than other sports. And with the economy what it is today and gas prices what they will be later this year, fans are increasingly deciding the time off of work and/or the cost of driving to Madison isn’t worth the trip.

Madison isn’t letting state go without a fight:

It’s odd that the video doesn’t show why the first person on the video is famous, so I will:

There is also one big potential unintended consequences of the state basketball tournament’s leaving Madison. Wisconsin is the only state in the U.S. in which the entire state boys and girls basketball tournaments are on free TV. It’s helpful for the originating station for the state tournament to be in Madison; that will not be the case when the tournament moves to Green Bay. There is no guarantee moving state out of Madison will mean games before Saturday, and perhaps even the entire tournament, won’t move to Fox Sports Wisconsin, which will take state away from those without cable or satellite TV.

Readers might think from my anti-Madison rants that I would like to see state basketball leave Madison. Readers would be making the wrong assumption. Having state on the UW campus gives high school students statewide a taste of the UW, something that won’t happen with a Green Bay state tournament. (The Resch Center is on the opposite side of Green Bay from the UW–Green Bay campus, even though UWGB’s men play at the Resch Center.) Neither Madison nor Green Bay is remotely close to the geographic center of the state, but Madison is slightly closer to the population center of the state (which as of 2000 was, believe it or don’t, Markesan) than Green Bay.

As one Madison.com poster put it:

So sad that money has got in the way of giving our children a great experience.

When I was in school. Going to state, meant Madison. Why? Madison is our Capitol. (Regardless of current politics) Madison is home to The University of Wisconsin and our Badgers.

Going to State meant playing on the same floor, grass, ice, etc. as our heroes from the Badgers. Have our team and players name on the same scoreboard, sitting on the very benches.

Too bad our WIAA has become so greedy. Our UW has lost its sense of civic duty to the youth of our state. And once again The City dropped the ball. (To busy building bike boxes to even know the ball was in the air)

On the other hand, other comments make you understand why Anderson wants state basketball to leave Madison (if that really is the case):

Good, two weeks of less traffic in Madison each spring.

UW should have priority over their own facilities. If the WIAA couldn’t run it on Tuesday – Thursday, then too bad. Green Bay is a ghost town in March. Nice people, but hardly a destination that I’d want to go to be in the state tournament.

Madison put itself in this position and deserves what it gets. Hopefully the mayor will wake earlier from his nap next time. The UW just made it clear what it thinks of a tradition going back to 1920 and its loyalty to the community it lives in.

It became open for discussion and competitive bidding. But Madison doesn’t know how to compete with other cities, or considers itself beneath such things. And the UW didn’t see that it was weighing a tradition that engaged the entire state community vs 300 yahoos from St. Cloud State. We are paying for our entitled sensibility. If you look at Epic, the Edgewater, Spectrum, Madison Prep,and now the tournament, you see a city that has lost its way. We don’t like competition. Our chief product is acrimony. Other cities are more than willing to exploit it. This trend will continue unless we become honest about ourselves and change things. Madison may be livable, but we aren’t as great as we think we are. Losing the tournament isn’t about lost revenue. It’s about lost leadership.

As a native of Green Bay who now lives in Madison, I say good for Green Bay. I get so sick of the arrogance around here that the sun rises and sets around this town. … People in this part of the state seem to think that Green Bay is a one-horse town and some backwater. If Green Bay can accommodate 70,000 plus fans every weekend for a Packer game, I think they can handle entertaining 10,000 people for a basketball tournament.

And then there are comments that are completely irrelevant, yet understandable:

Perhaps the liberal retards in Madison can organize an anti-Walker rally for that weekend instead and invite their government union thug buddies from out of state for a big group hug. And don’t forget to bring the tractors. This way all the restaurants, bars and hotels can still get the revenue.

The GB/Fox Valley area has everything and more that Madison has when it comes to entertainment, shopping and lodging minus the protesters and socialists. Some of the comments here just prove what a pretentious entitlement attitude some Madison residents have. I can’t blame them, I wouldn’t want to come here either.

Of course, Recallarama had nothing to do with the WIAA’s decision to move its biggest state tournament out of Madison. (For one thing, most high school coaches are teachers, and most WIAA management are former teachers.) But Madison is about to let leave an event that has more economic impact than any winter/spring sports event other than an NCAA basketball first- and second-round That’s something UW should have thought about

My prediction is that if state goes to Green Bay, a Madison-area state legislator will introduce a proposal to have the Department of Public Instruction run high school sports instead of the WIAA. The rationale, which I first brought up in the WIAA’s fight to preserve for itself broadcast rights, will be that high school sports are funded by tax dollars, and the WIAA uses tax dollars with no public accountability. At least it would make Superintendent of Public Instruction elections more interesting.