A year from today, Division II will crown team champions in six sports at the division’s fifth National Championships Festival in Louisville.

Regardless of who wins in 2010, though, there’s already one champion as far as Division II is concerned. Host Bellarmine University is teaming with the Louisville Sports Commission to conduct the second fall-sports iteration of the festival, which will feature 70 teams and more than 800 student-athletes vying for championships in men’s and women’s cross country, field hockey, men’s and women’s soccer, and women’s volleyball. The event begins with opening ceremonies on November 30 and concludes with championship events and closing ceremonies on December 4.

Bellarmine, a member of the Great Lakes Valley Conference, is the first Division II institution to host the festival since West Florida in fall 2006. The festival’s Olympic-style approach presents a number of logistical challenges to host institutions because of facilities, lodging and timing, but Bellarmine officials regard the 2010 festival as an opportunity to showcase the institution, the division and the hundreds of student-athlete participants.

“NCAA athletics is a great way to let people know who you are and where you are,” said Bellarmine President Joseph J. McGowan. “Our enthusiasm for and openness to hosting the festival is rooted in our vision to be the top private university in the region. Part of that is increasing our commitment to excellence across the university, and in this case to athletics.”

Bellarmine is no stranger to hosting NCAA championships, having had the men’s basketball finals from 1995 through 2000. But the Division II National Championships Festival is a different kind of event.

Created to enhance the student-athlete experience, raise awareness and exposure for Division II sports and increase attendance by hosting multiple championships in one location, the festivals feature opening and closing ceremonies, social opportunities for student-athletes, and community-engagement events. Student-athletes are housed in centrally located hotels, allowing for an athlete-village-type atmosphere.

Division II held its first festival in spring 2004 in Orlando and conducted a fall festival in November 2006 in Pensacola. The spring 2008 and winter 2009 festivals were both in Houston.

“When I first heard about the opportunity and realized the scope of the festival – which is very impressive – I was wondering how much we could accommodate all the different sports and the venues they require,” said McGowan, who has been president at Bellarmine since 1990. “Was I concerned at first? Yes, but if you’re in a sports-crazy part of the world with a commitment to sports yourself, you can get the cooperation you need.”

Much of that cooperation is at the direction of Bellarmine Athletics Director Scott Wiegandt.

From a facilities standpoint, Bellarmine is offering its own Knights Hall and Owsley B. Frazier Stadium as the practice and competition venues for volleyball and soccer, respectively. But Bellarmine is also getting help from its Division I neighbor University of Louisville with the Cardinals’ Trager Stadium as the field hockey site and from the Louisville Sports Commission with E.P. “Tom” Sawyer State Park as the cross country venue.

As for staffing, Wiegandt said Bellarmine will have it covered, from the school’s own personnel to an army of volunteers.

“Division II athletics administrators often have to wear many hats, and staffing is an issue unless you have great buy-in from your community,” Wiegandt said. “My goal is to staff this with excellence – I want a championship atmosphere and feel about the entire event and provide a quality experience for the student-athletes.”

McGowan agreed. “You have to commit from the outset to do it exceptionally well or you shouldn’t do it at all,” he said. “We owe that to the student-athletes and the teams that have made it to the championship level to give them a great experience.”

Wiegandt and McGowan have embraced the festival approach as a benefit not only to the host institution but to the division overall.

“We very much support Division II, all the while being in a Division I part of the country,” McGowan said. “Division II gives us a great niche for competitiveness with a different kind of character, so we are big fans of Division II.

“We are working to build each of our programs to keep us regularly at a high level of competitiveness, both within the conference and nationally. So hosting the festival is an opportunity that presented itself at a time in which we were focusing on competitiveness, recommitting to athletics and expanding our own visibility and hospitality.”

McGowan joins former basketball student-athletes George Tinsley Sr. and January Taylor as honorary co-chairs of the event’s local organizing committee. Taylor is a 1999 Bellarmine graduate; Tinsley played at Division II Kentucky Wesleyan and is a Louisville native.

While the festival is still a year away, it already has created a buzz in a region that shares its athletics among Divisions I and II schools.

“There is a genuine sense of excitement in the area,” McGowan said. “This is a big deal.”