THE FRONT ROW WITH MARK NELKE: Sunday, November 30, 2014

With the glut of college basketball tournaments on the tube this holiday weekend, you couldn't help but notice one thing:

All those empty seats.

It wasn't that long ago you could name all the big-time tourneys - the Maui Invitational has been big for decades, but the Great Alaska Shootout used to be a big deal, as was the Rainbow Classic, over the Christmas holidays in Honolulu.

The preseason NIT, in its various forms of names (it's now the NIT Season Tip-off, which Gonzaga won the other night), still carries some clout.

(As much as we'd like to, we're not lumping the Otis Spunkmeyer Classic in with those luminaries.)

The Far West Classic in Portland, where Idaho stunned Oregon State on its way to an eventual Sweet 16 appearance in 1982-83, used to be a big deal before it came to an end in 1996.

There was even a local tourney, including Idaho, Gonzaga, Washington State and Eastern Washington, back in the late 1980s.

(I kinda miss that one, which was played in the old Spokane Coliseum, but that's for another day).

THESE DAYS, anywhere with a building and a promoter willing to pay to bring teams in can host a tourney.

Some of the Johnny Come Lately tournaments include the Puerto Rico Tip-off, Paradise Jam (St. Thomas, Virgin Islands), Battle 4 Atlantis (the Bahamas), the Wooden Legacy and the Orlando Classic (in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., of course). And that's not counting several others where the first few rounds are played at campus sites, with four teams advancing to the semifinals at the tourney site.

The good thing about these tournaments for the fans is you get some pretty good matchups in November. Often these are seen at the Maui Invitational, which usually draws a strong field because, well, what good program wouldn't want to take their team (and their fans) to Hawaii this time of year?

This year, Arizona beat San Diego State in a matchup of two of the top teams on the West Coast.

These tourneys are good for the teams because they get to play other good teams on a neutral court, in a tournament atmosphere - exactly what they'll run into during March Madness.

Back in the Patrick Ewing/coach John Thompson days, Georgetown rarely played any tough teams in the preseason, figuring the Big East schedule was enough of a meat grinder. Big John may have had a point, but it sure made for some yawners in November and December.

However, these days, where strength of schedule means so much in choosing bubble teams for the NCAA tournament, Georgetown, now coached by John Thompson III, is a regular at these early season tourneys.

The days of the Hoyas beating up on the likes of Shenandoah are in the past.

HOWEVER, IT can't look too good for hardly anybody to be in the stands for most of these games.

There's a tournament I've tuned in to watch in recent years, mostly because it was played on the West Coast. It started as the 76 Classic, then the Anaheim Classic, then the DirecTV Classic. It was played at the Anaheim Convention Center, capacity 7,400. Suffice it to say there were few capacity crowds.

Eventually, the DirecTV Classic merged with the Wooden Classic, a neutral-site doubleheader honoring the great UCLA coach, in 2013 to form the Wooden Legacy.

This year, preliminary round games are played not in a spacious arena, but in a bandbox at Cal State Fullerton known as Titan Gym, capacity 4,000.

Again, watching the other day, there was not quite a full house for any of the games.

Really? I don't think the great John Wooden's "legacy" was games played in front of thousands of empty chairs - or bleachers, in this case.

However, it's the same scene at most other tourneys - it's just that some arenas are better than others at darkening the background so you don't notice all the empty seats.

Everywhere else, you can just imagine the TV producer, in the truck, ordering his camera guys, "Do not pan up and show all the empty seats in the upper bowl, or you will sleep in an igloo tonight."

Could be worse. There could still be the Otis Spunkmeyer Classic, which, surely you'll recall, was played in Oakland in the 1990s.

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter@CdAPressSports.