In a surprise Wednesday afternoon announcement, the Ivy League office stated that the 2024 Ivy League men’s and women’s basketball tournaments will be held at Columbia’s Levien Gymnasium. Specific dates for the four-day event have not been posted.
The announcement signals a substantial change in the Ivy League’s rotation of tournament locations set in 2019. Brown was slated to host the tournaments next in 2024.
The Ivy League attributed the move to Levien Gym to gym renovations being finished sooner than expected when the original tourney rotation was announced in a statement Wednesday.
“The future of the rotation remains under continuous evaluation,” Ivy League spokesman Matt Panto told Ivy Hoops Online in an email Wednesday. “The league is excited to bring the tournaments to Princeton next month and New York City in 2024.”
Brown Athletics did not respond to a request for comment.
“New York City is home to passionate and dedicated alumni and fans from all eight Ivy League institutions,” Ivy League executive director Robin Harris said in Wednesday’s statement. “Coupled with the energy of March Madness and the enthusiasm that this event has built over just a short period of time, the league could not be more excited to host Ivy Madness in the Big Apple.”
In February 2019, following two tournaments at Penn and one at Yale, the conference came up with a geographic rotational plan that would allow each of the eight schools to host once through 2025.
That plan had Harvard welcoming the teams in the spring of 2020, but the COVID-19 pandemic forced the games to be canceled. With the 2020-21 season canceled for the same reason by the eight school presidents, Harvard hosted in 2022, with the remaining five schools having their hosting duties shifted by two years.
After Princeton hosts this year’s version of Ivy Madness in March, Brown was scheduled for 2024, Cornell in 2025, Dartmouth in 2026 and Columbia for 2027.
Next year’s shift to Morningside Heights is ostensibly good news for Columbia hoops, namely women’s coach Megan Griffith, whose Lions are tied atop the Ivy standings and eyeing a potential Ivy League Tournament rubber match against four-time defending champion Princeton at Jadwin Gym next month.
“All I know right now is just the change,” Griffith told reporters during her weekly media availability Wednesday. “I’m hoping this means that we’ll have a more robust conversation about what it looks like after this.”