New Host City -- Springfield, MO

The past eight years the National Christian Homeschool Basketball Championships has enjoyed a very special relationship with its host city, Oklahoma City. Prior to arriving in OKC the NCHBC had moved five times during its first ten years including stints in San Antonio, TX, Estes Park, CO, and Santa Fe NM. The NCHBC experienced tremendous growth during the last eight years, growing from just over 100teams to more than 300 in 2008. “Our experience in OKC was tremendous. We benefited from the central location, the stability of being in the same location for eight years and the great people we worked with at the OCCVB, local colleges and area businesses. OKC has been experiencing a significant economic growth the last few years, culminating this summer the acquiring of an NBA Sonics team. We applaud these exciting events for the OKC but in the end the growth of both the tournament and the city made it necessary for us to look at other options for the championships starting in 2009” states Tim Flatt, Executive Director for the NCHBC.

“We carefully looked at ten cities and as of today we have a new home for at least the next three years. We are excited to announce our new host city is Springfield, MO” adds Flatt.

The NCHBC staff has worked very closely with the Springfield Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB) and the Springfield Sports Commission to make certain that the 2009 National Tournament will be a great experience for all teams and families that attend. Springfield was selected over ten other cities for the following reasons:
1) Facilities
2) Hotel Rates and Availability
3) The support of the CVB and Sports Commission
4) Location
5) Televised games


Facilities

Showcase and Championship Saturday -- The NCHBC has secured the use of the Hammons Student Center at Missouri State University for both Wednesday and Saturday. The Hammons Student Center has a capacity of 8,846. This will give room for growth as the Sawyer Center at SNU held 5,000 last year. Additionally, MSU is building a new facility that will seat 12,000 that will be a valid option if we out grow the Hammonds Center.

College Gyms - We will be using Evangel College, Drury University, Central Bible College and Baptist Bible College. These are all top quality college gyms that hold 1,500-3,500 fans and will be perfect for semi-final games.
Other Gyms - Springfield Public Schools and Springfield Parks and Recreation are making their gyms available for the NCHBC. The gyms will be a very significant upgrade from the gyms in OKC which have been very good the past few years.



Hotel Rates and Availability

One of the concerns about OKC was the continuing rise of hotel rates. The bottom line is that Springfield offers our families 800 plus hotel rooms less than $79.00 per night and another 800 between $80-89 per night. It is estimated that families will save over $300,000 in hotel costs in 2009.

IMPORTANT
The Springfield CVB has negotiated group rates with virtually every quality hotel in Springfield. These rooms will be offered via a special website starting Tuesday August 12 at 9:00 AM. We will post a link on the website and Blog, as well as send an e-mail with the link.

VERY IMPORTANT
It is very important that everyone either uses this service provided the CVB or notifies us if they chose to make other hotel arrangements. Let me explain why this is so important. The purpose of CVB is bring events to their city. Their effectiveness is measured in room nights. The more room nights the more the CVB is willing to do to help events. How does this affect you? In our agreement with the CVB there are certain arrangements that we have that are directly affected by room nights. The kinds of things that the CVB helps us with is the cost of the Hammons Student Center. Additionally if we want to move to the new facility this will be determined by the room nights we use. When the CVB covers cost for Hammons Student Center that allows us to use sponsor's funds to get our events on television.
The hotels listed on the CVB site give us the most credit but if you choose to stay somewhere else contact us and we will get some credit and may even be able to negotiate a better rate through the CVB.

Why are some hotels not listed?
1) We chose to not to list hotels with high attrition rates. Some hotels require you to pay for 80% of the rooms you hold whether you use them or not.
2) We chose to avoid hotels that are often rented by the hour more than the day.
3) We chose to not use hotels that were in unsafe or unseemly areas.

Televised Games
It is our plan to eventually have nine NCHBC games televised. This would include local, regional and national coverage. We are negotiating with various stations at this time. We are confident that we will work our way to nine games; however, we may have to start this year with 3-5 games televised. The number of games will be directly related to how much sponsor money we can direct toward this goal of increasing exposure. The funds for this project will come directly from the CVB sponsorship and fundraising through the Founders Club. Next week we will give you an update on the Founder's Club.

Central Location
The location of Springfield will be a tremendous asset in the continued growth of the NCHBC. The move will add an extra 200 miles for most Texas teams and an extra 280 miles for OKC, West Texas, New Mexico, AZ and CA . However, it will still be a one day trip (5-10 hours for most of the teams) for all teams that are currently a one day trip from this region. AZ and CA will remain a two day trip. The positive is that now almost every other team that attends Nationals will be able to get the in one day.

We believe that our biggest area for growth over the next few years is from the Midwest - Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Iowa as we have been able to identify almost 200 teams from this region that don't currently attend Nationals. Now we are within a day's drive for virtually all of these teams and with your help we may be able to encourage many to attend.