2009 Regional Dates Announced (Unofficial)

[Vikesrock]

Originally Posted by RMiller

My understanding is that the will be on the Minneapolis University of Minnesota campus. One in Williams Arena where is was this year and one in Mariucci Arena.

Last I heard about numbers of MN teams was this: last year there were 54 teams (38 rookies, 14 second year teams, a third year team, and a fourth year team). From my understanding, there shouldn't be any loss of teams. Beyond that, there were at least 20+ teams already planning to start a team during the late spring time frame. As was mentioned previously, there were enough teams from the Dakotas and Minnesota, that not all those teams could go to Minneapolis. On top of that, only five teams from outside the Dakotas and MN were able to come.
That is the reason for the multiple regionals. I didn't realize though that they decided to go that route versus a super regional.

This is correct. The North Star Regional will be held in Mariucci Arena and the 10,000 Lakes Regional will be held in Williams Arena (with pits in the Sports Pavillion). Someone previously in the thread mentioned the events being 3 miles away from each other, the buildings are actually right across the street from each other.

If I had to guess the reason that they choose to go with this dual regional setup I would say that decision likely fell out of the available venues. They couldn't make a single regional much if any bigger than it was this past year and demand for space already exceeded the number of spots even if just MN and Dakota's teams were counted (10 MN teams attended WI as their only regional and only 5 teams outside MN, ND, SD came to MN). Unlike a number of the University of Minnesota buildings Marriuci and Williams Arena are not connected by underground tunnels and routinely transporting robots outside in the winter in MN is just not a good idea. So the only real way they could increase capacity would be to have two separate events so the robots did not have to travel between the venues.

For those that are unsure of why MN has 2 simultaneous regionals, check the registration when all is said and done. I have a strong feeling that both events will be at max capacity.