MAC restoring championship tournaments in eight sports
A security guard watches a MAC Tournament game March 12 at Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse in Cleveland, OH.
The Mid-American Conference is moving back toward normalcy.
In May of 2020, the MAC eliminated conference tournaments for eight sports. On Friday, the conference announced that those tournaments would be re-instated for the 2021-22 athletic year. The Detroit News' Tony Paul first reported the news.
"At my direction, I asked our Championship staff to create models of how we return our postseason events," said MAC commissioner Jon Steinbrecher in a statement. "Conference tournaments are pinnacle events that provide lifetime memories for those involved. I am pleased we are able to reinstate these events for the student athletes."
This news affects baseball, softball, men's and women's soccer, men's and women's tennis, field hockey and lacrosse. All eight sports did not have a championship tournament in 2020-21.
In addition to the re-instatement of these eight tournaments, the volleyball tournament field has been expanded to six teams.
Seven of the eight sports will have tournament fields of four teams. Only women's soccer will have a six-team field. The previous year's regular season champion will host the MAC Tournament in field hockey and men's and women's tennis.
The other five sports will be hosted by the highest seed.
According to Paul's reports, the MAC presidents met this week and voted to bring back the championship tournaments.
