BATON ROUGE — The defending SEC Tournament champion LSU softball team will have the chance to defend its tournament title at home next season as the Tigers were selected to host the 2008 SEC Tournament at Tiger Park on May 8-10.
In 2004, the tournament went from a neutral site to on-campus sites with the theory that the site would alternate alphabetically between Western Division and Eastern Division teams. Programs were given the option of passing on their hosting opportunity, which has benefited LSU, which would not have hosted until 2011 if all teams hosted in order. In the four seasons of on-campus sites, Alabama, Florida, Georgia and Auburn have hosted in that order.
“This is obviously a great advantage for us for many reasons,” said LSU head coach Yvette Girouard. “Not merely for the fact that we will be playing in front of our home crowd on our home field, but also because it will help our student-athletes during finals week. In the past, our players have been forced to take all of their finals in a limited amount of time because of postseason travel, including the SEC Tournament and NCAA Regionals, which fall during finals at LSU. Playing at home will give our student-athletes the opportunity to take their finals in a more reasonable time frame.”
Following the 2008 season, the league will re-evaluate the campus site hosting and may choose to return to a neutral site. The tournament was held in Columbus, Ga., from 1997 to 2000, before a two-year stint in Chattanooga, Tenn., from 2001-2002 and a one-year appearance in Plant City, Fla., in 2003. The most likely place for the tournament would be in Orange Beach, Ala., site of the annual SEC Soccer Tournament, which moved to the Alabama coast city in 2003, with only a 2004 alternate site after the town was ravaged by Hurricane Ivan that September.
“We are thrilled and tickled that the tournament will be held at LSU because in 2009 we will likely move the tournament to a neutral site, which will probably be in Orange Beach,” said Girouard.
In 2008, the Tigers will be trying to break a trend as the SEC Tournament host has been quite unlucky in play. None of the previous four campus hosts have won the tournament title, or even advanced to the championship game. In 2007, Auburn did not even qualify for the tournament, which was held at its home site, the first host site that has failed to qualify.
The tournament will be held from Thursday, May 8 through Saturday, May 11. The top eight teams overall in the league standings will advance to the tournament and the champion will earn the conference’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. In the third season of the single elimination format, the top eight teams will pay on Thursday. The semifinals are scheduled for Friday, with the championship game held on Saturday.
The Tigers have now participated in all 11 conference tournaments in the league’s history. LSU owns a 33-11 overall record in SEC Tournament play, and have won the tournament a conference-record five times ? 1999, 2001, 2002, 2004 and 2007. The Tigers have advanced through the tournament into the championship game in eight of the last nine seasons, missing the championship game only once, in 2005, since 1999.
LSU is one of only three teams with a winning record in the tournament and its .750 winning percentage is the best in the conference. That winning percentage is almost two percentage points better than the next best team in the league (Alabama – .568). No other team has won the SEC Tournament championship more than three times and no other team has appeared in the championship game more than three times, while LSU has won it five times and made eight appearances in the title game.