David Moulton: Can Southwest Florida blossom into a hotbed for women's hoops?

Four thousand, five hundred and forty-three.

That's how many people went to see a women's college basketball game Monday night at Alico Arena.

Just imagine if they served beer.

FGCU had many things working in its favor: a high-profile opponent in Florida; a fairly well-publicized 42-game home court winning streak; a track record of winning.

But 4,543 people don't just show up for women's basketball. Even when the home team is playing in the NCAA tournament. At the same time that FGCU hosted Florida in the NIT, Duke and Penn State (two perennial powerhouse programs), hosted NCAA second-round tournament games. Weather was not a factor.

Duke drew 3,644 people. Penn State, 3,276.

Which begs the question: could Southwest Florida one day could play host to the first two rounds of the NCAA women's basketball tournament?

The answer would seem to be when, not if. For two reasons.

If FGCU were part of the equation, one would think that at least the same number of people who showed up Monday night would attend the NCAA tournament game as well. At least.

Well, of the eight NCAA tournament games Monday night, the 4,543 at Alico would have been the fourth biggest crowd (and two of the three sites were Tennessee and Stanford, both No. 1 seeds).

But for Southwest Florida to be seriously considered as a host site for first and second round NCAA tournament games, the worst-case scenario has to be deliberated. How many people would attend an NCAA women's tournament game if FGCU were not part of it? Because the site is awarded at least a year in advance. No guarantee the "home" team is going to make the NCAAs and in FGCU's case, they could realistically make it as a No. 12 or 13 seed and lose in the first round.

So let's say North Carolina and Kentucky met at Alico or Germain Arena. Or Temple vs. Notre Dame? Because that's exactly the games that took place on neutral courts (Albuquerque, N.M., and Salt Lake City, respectively) Monday night.

Fifth-seeded North Carolina beat fourth-seeded Kentucky in front of 1,877 fans. Second-seeded Notre Dame got past No. 10 seed Temple before a crowd of 1,567.

I've got to believe that we'd have at least 2,000 fans at those games if they were held here.

So the bigger story out of Monday night is that FGCU may have lost to Florida but the Fort Myers-Naples market seems not just a viable, but a realistic future NCAA women's tournament site.

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With 7,545 fans attending FGCU's two home WNIT games in the last week, how long before the Atlantic Sun plays its basketball championship tournaments at Alico Arena? Granted, the first week of March is an expensive time to secure the necessary hotel rooms for 14 teams, but the last two years the Atlantic Sun has held their conference tournament at Mercer in Macon, Ga.

During that time, the largest crowd for any of the 14 women's games was 833.

In the men's tourney, Mercer made the finals two years ago. Along the way their largest crowd was 3,200. The largest crowd for a game not involving the home team was 1,020.

One would think with a trip to March Madness on the line that we would put these attendance figures to shame.

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Finally, give it up to the Florida Everblades. Faced with a crucial road trip last weekend in Gwinnett, the Everblades, after a major overhaul of the roster in the last month, swept a three-game series from the Gladiators. Even more remarkably, they did it after falling behind in all three games, 2-0 in each of the first two.

The Blades now seem very likely to make the playoffs for a 13th consecutive season. They end the year with six straight at home beginning Wednesday night.
