Kennedy-King College to host Region 4 tournaments for two seasons

Kennedy-King College has locked in a rare two-season run as the home of Region 4 Division I postseason basketball, a bid that gives the City Colleges of Chicago system a bigger role in the junior-college bracket and puts Chicago on a more visible tournament map. The school was selected at a Region 4 meeting in Elgin, Illinois, and the formal announcement followed on June 16.

The assignment covers both the men’s and women’s tournaments for the 2026-27 and 2027-28 seasons, turning Kennedy-King into a repeat destination for the region’s most consequential games. In a postseason setting where every possession can decide who moves on to nationals, the host site has to do more than open the doors. It has to manage the bracket, handle travel and game-day logistics, and create the kind of atmosphere that matches the stakes.

That matters in a region that has already used Triton College in River Grove as a championship stage. Region 4’s 2026 Division I men’s and women’s tournaments were held there, with quarterfinals at higher seeds and semifinal and championship rounds at Triton. The women’s title game produced one of the region’s sharpest recent results: Olive-Harvey College beat host Triton 70-62 to win its first Region 4 Division I women’s basketball championship. Kennedy-King now inherits that kind of stage-setting responsibility for the next cycle.

For Kennedy-King, the bid also sharpens the school’s basketball profile beyond the bracket itself. La-Troy Farrow, who serves as the athletic director and men’s basketball head coach, will now guide a program with a postseason spotlight attached to its home campus. Willie Little Gymnasium already anchors the school’s basketball operations, and the new role should bring more eyes to the building, more attention to the programs that play there, and more visibility for athletes trying to build their reputations in Region 4.

The larger impact reaches across City Colleges of Chicago and the region’s rotating-host model. Region 4 has routinely moved postseason events among different schools, which spreads the responsibility and keeps the championship path tied to multiple campuses. Kennedy-King’s two-year turn strengthens that rotation while giving Chicago a steadier postseason footprint, one that can help with recruiting, community turnout and the operational upgrades that come with hosting men’s and women’s Division I tournaments in consecutive seasons.