Plywood covers the football field during the transformation to a basketball court for the NCAA men's basketball tournament Midwest Regional at Ford Field in Detroit. The NCAA will experiment with a new-look configuration for the Detroit and Houston regionals, hoping to improve the way fans watch the game in person and how the spectacle looks on TV.

Plywood covers the football field during the transformation to a basketball court for the NCAA men's basketball tournament Midwest Regional at Ford Field in Detroit. The NCAA will experiment with a new-look configuration for the Detroit and Houston regionals, hoping to improve the way fans watch the game in person and how the spectacle looks on TV.

Detroit ? The NCAA Tournament will experiment with a new-look configuration during two regionals, hoping to improve the way fans watch the game in person and how the event looks on TV.

In Detroit and Houston, basketball courts will be set up in the middle of the field surrounded by newly created risers that were designed to provide unobstructed-view seating.

The hardwood will be 27 inches off the ground – above the 50-yard line – at Ford Field to create a staging effect as a quartet of teams compete later this month for a spot in the Final Four.

The home of the Detroit Lions began its transformation to hoops on Tuesday as plywood and plastic were placed on the artificial turf. About 100 workers, who are expected to work 14-hour shifts, then began unloading trucks filled with material that will be used to create the seating system that was scheduled to take a week to install.

The facility is expected to be ready by March 25, three days before the games begin.

“This is the first time this has ever been done,” said Bob Gardner, Ford Field’s senior director of facility management.

The Final Four next month at San Antonio’s Alamodome is expected to be the last one in which the court is near an end zone, with bleachers on one side and curtains cutting off some of the sections.

When the Motor City serves as host for the Final Four next year, the NCAA plans to use the same setup it will debut at the regional semifinals and finals March 28-30 in Detroit and Houston.

In Houston, curtains will still be used in the end zones for this year’s tournament, but they’ll be gone when it plays host to the 2011 Final Four.

“The NCAA has done a great job at looking at the next generation of this event,” Shea Guinn, president of SMG-Reliant Park, said in a telephone interview from Houston. “What’s happening here and in Detroit is the next step in the evolution of what has become one of the biggest sporting events in the entire country.”

For the folks at Ford Field, they’ve had some practice packing 70,000-plus people into the venue for hoops.

Kentucky beat Michigan State on Dec. 13, 2003, before a basketball world-record crowd of 78,129 fans.

The Wildcats made shots with daylight peeking through a 65-foot high glass wall, students without seats bounced on the turf and binoculars were a popular accessory in the upper deck.

BasketBowl’s attendance record is safe, but enough tickets have already been sold to beat the previous mark for a regional without the benefit of knowing who even has a chance to play in Detroit.

In Houston, Guinn said, 29,000 tickets have been sold.