https://www.baltimoresun.com/business/bs-bz-ciaa-basketball-tournament-20190107-story.html
The Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association plans to announce this morning that it will move its popular men’s and women’s basketball tournaments to Baltimore for three years beginning in 2021, potentially providing a huge economic boost from up to 150,000 people attending games, shows and forums during the weeklong event.
The CIAA is made up of smaller lower-division historically black colleges and universities, including Bowie State University in Maryland. Nonetheless its tournament week has provided Charlotte, N.C., with one of its largest annual tourism events in the 13 years the event’s been held there, with a reported annual economic impact exceeding $50 million.
Local tourism officials, who beat out counterparts in Norfolk, Va., and Charlotte, are banking on such spinoff from the tournament as well as positive marketing for the city after losing several major conventions in recent years.
“The CIAA basketball tournament is more than a basketball championship; it’s a social event, a family reunion,” said Al Hutchinson, president and CEO of Visit Baltimore. “There is a huge alumni base that lives in the D.C.-Maryland-Virginia region and north in Pennsylvania and New Jersey and Boston, and that fan base wants to come down to this tournament.”
The Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association plans to announce this morning that it will move its popular men’s and women’s basketball tournaments to Baltimore for three years beginning in 2021, potentially providing a huge economic boost from up to 150,000 people attending games, shows and forums during the weeklong event.
The CIAA is made up of smaller lower-division historically black colleges and universities, including Bowie State University in Maryland. Nonetheless its tournament week has provided Charlotte, N.C., with one of its largest annual tourism events in the 13 years the event’s been held there, with a reported annual economic impact exceeding $50 million.
Local tourism officials, who beat out counterparts in Norfolk, Va., and Charlotte, are banking on such spinoff from the tournament as well as positive marketing for the city after losing several major conventions in recent years.
“The CIAA basketball tournament is more than a basketball championship; it’s a social event, a family reunion,” said Al Hutchinson, president and CEO of Visit Baltimore. “There is a huge alumni base that lives in the D.C.-Maryland-Virginia region and north in Pennsylvania and New Jersey and Boston, and that fan base wants to come down to this tournament.”
