The season-opening tournament featured four top teams -- Stanford University; the University of Hawaii, Manoa; Pennsylvania State University; and the University of Nebraska, Lincoln -- a live College Sports Television broadcast and a festive environment. It added up to the type of excitement stakeholders hope the sport's marquee event at the end of the season -- the national finals -- can emulate.

The Showcase, which was played in Omaha's Qwest Center, featured back-to-back doubleheaders that drew 10,028 fans the first night and 10,576 the second. The college volleyball community is thinking of ways to generate the same kind of interest at the championship finals in December after a recent flattening of postseason attendance numbers.

The championship already benefits from televised regionals and finals, the latter by ESPN, but officials want the semifinal and championship matches to be a crescendo for a sport they believe has untapped potential.

An idea gaining momentum is holding the women's volleyball finals at the same site for a two-year cycle. The prevailing thought is that such continuity could lead to more fans in the seats, more excitement in the arena and a better student-athlete experience.

Members of the Division I Women's Volleyball Committee are studying to see if there is interest in a community wanting to serve as host for more than one year.

"We would like to see more attendance at the championships site," said committee Chair Kelly Andrews, senior associate athletics director at the University of Toledo. "It's good right now, but we think like in any other situation when you have an opportunity to do something a second time, there are other things you can improve upon. People become a little more familiar with it so they may be more inclined to support it and attend."

Butch Hug, an assistant athletics director in event management at Nebraska, said the AVCA/NACWAA Showcase has helped ticket sales for the upcoming regional his institution is hosting at the Qwest Center.

"What it did was pique the interest,'' Hug said. "Everyone anticipates (Nebraska) being there. The Qwest Center seats around 16,500. We've already sold 10,000, and we feel when we host the 2006 finals we probably will be close to capacity. We're trying to get a fan base built up. People saw that competition in August, and when the regional tickets went on sale, it was a selling point for us."

Holding the finals in a hotbed for the sport is another way to build the sport's stature.

"What we're looking for is an area that can support volleyball and that has shown some sort of history doing it," Andrews said. "You would assume there is a natural increase in the second year just by people being familiar with it, and it becomes something they can plan on."

Omaha; Honolulu; and Madison, Wisconsin, are places that have shown strong support for women's volleyball in the past.

Hug said his institution would be interested in hosting for multiple years should the decision to go that route come to fruition. He's fairly certain that organizers in Omaha would like to partner in such a deal, since the city is synonymous with the College World Series, which has been held there for the last 56 years.

"Fan support for volleyball in the Midwest and in Nebraska is very good," Hug said. "Our team has been in the mix for quite a few years. We realize we're not going to be in it every year, but we feel we have a fan base to support the event and they will come to see championship volleyball (even if Nebraska isn't competing)."

In the 1980s, Nebraska served as host of the men's gymnastics championships seven times, and Hug thought the familiarity of hosting the event piqued local interest and also gave teams and their supporters a knowledge of what to expect at the championship site.

The 2005 women's volleyball championship site is San Antonio's Alamodome, which will be configured for a capacity of 12,000 in the arena's lower bowl to create as intimate an atmosphere as possible. Through late November, more than 7,700 tickets had been sold.

Last year, 8,826 fans attended the championship match at Long Beach State University's Walter Pyramid. Attendance for the 2003 final in Dallas was slightly more than 7,200, and just over 6,400 for the 2002 championship match in New Orleans.

While committee members believe those totals are acceptable, they would like to see the championship threaten or surpass the record totals posted at Wisconsin in 1998 (13,194) and 1993 (11,114).

Joe Sagula, AVCA president and coach at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, has attended 25 NCAA women's volleyball finals through the years. He isn't concerned with the size of the arena, but with the atmosphere in the arena.

"I think it's a little sterile right now," Sagula said. "I think you want to create an event, not just stage a competitive match. I believe people want to be entertained."

Sagula thinks the committee should consider taking a page from the Division I Men's Basketball Championship, which has successfully staged ancillary events to capture fan interest.

Sagula said the best atmosphere and attendance he's seen recently at the women's volleyball finals came in 1998 at Wisconsin when a record crowd of 13,194 watched Long Beach State cap a perfect season by defeating Penn State in five games.

"I've been to places that hold 3,000 people -- when you get a crowd in there that's close to the court, it really creates an intimate, awesome, electric environment," Sagula said. "You want to try to recreate that feel in a bigger venue. That's going to help the sport. You want people leaving the arena saying, 'That was exciting.' "

If that's the goal, it's up to the committee to determine how to do it, and to decide if the concept of a multi-year site is a good place to start.

Division I Women's Volleyball Championship attendance