The NCAA tournament is about to get ruined.

[uconndogs]

Agreed. The NCAA Tournament is going to be fine. If they split it will be all football.

That tournament rakes in a small fortune. Why would the mega conferences stop after football?

This is professional athletics in every sense. These are valuable properties and universities and conferences are going to grab for everything they can. NIL has opened the door for huge payouts for the athletes and the money is going to have to come from somewhere.

I seriously doubt the NCAA Tournament even remotely resembles its current form in 5-10 years.

 

[HuskyHawk]

That tournament rakes in a small fortune. Why would the mega conferences stop after football?

This is professional athletics in every sense. These are valuable properties and universities and conferences are going to grab for everything they can. NIL has opened the door for huge payouts for the athletes and the money is going to have to come from somewhere.

I seriously doubt the NCAA Tournament even remotely resembles its current form in 5-10 years.

Because it wouldn't rake in nearly as much money without the broad participation of over 300 D1 programs. Meanwhile, they win most of the time anyway, so get an outsized portion of the revenue without having to run the tournament. Nobody would be interested in a P5 only tournament.

 

[CL82]

Because it wouldn't rake in nearly as much money without the broad participation of over 300 D1 programs..

I’m not sure that that’s actually correct, but in any event the analysis is not a whether a P5, or even a P2 tournament would make as much money as the existing NCAA tournament. The analysis is whether a P5, or even a P2 tournament would make more money than having those conferences participate in the existing NCAA structure. It would, by a large margin.

I’ve said this before, and it seems to be catching on here a bit, there is a notion that a P2 tournaments would definitionally only involve those teams. I guess that could happen, but not if they have any one who is reasonably intelligent setting the thing up. The way to do it is have a P2 sponsored tournament that invites other teams from D1 to participate. All they need to do is get a linear media deal to broadcast it and promise the teams that get the invite more money than they would currently get for participating in the NCAA tournament. Does that sound familiar, because it’s exactly how the NCAA nudged out the NIT as college basketball‘s premiere tournament. It really is just that easy.

This is low hanging fruit. It will happen, eventually, the question is not if, but when.

 

[uconndogs]

I’m not sure that that’s actually correct, but in any event the analysis is not a whether a P5, or even a P2 tournament would make as much money as the existing NCAA tournament. The analysis is whether a P5, or even a P2 tournament would make more money than having those conferences participate in the existing NCAA structure. It would, by a large margin.

I’ve said this before, and it seems to be catching on here a bit, there is a notion that a P2 tournaments would definitionally only involve those teams. I guess that could happen, but not if they have any one who is reasonably intelligent setting the thing up. The way to do it is have a P2 sponsored tournament that invites other teams from D1 to participate. All they need to do is get a linear media deal to broadcast it and promise the teams that get the invite more money than they would currently get for participating in the NCAA tournament. Does that sound familiar, because it’s exactly how the NCAA nudged out the NIT as college basketball‘s premiere tournament. It really is just that easy.

This is low hanging fruit. It will happen, eventually, the question is not if, but when.

Exactly how I see it. It's not how much overall money there is to be made, it's about optimizing individual shares. Unfortunate? Yes, in my opinion very much so.......

 

[huskymedic]

 

[auror]

So no mention of removing autobids, but of expanding the field again.

Sankey, though, makes no mention of potentially taking away automatic bids. He’s aware that tinkering with one of the most popular formulas in college sports could lead to enormous backlash. Instead, he talks about the quality of teams that either just barely make the field or are left out.

“I thought [SEC member] Texas A&M should have been in the field in basketball [last season],” Sankey says. “People didn’t agree. But the way they played at the end of the year, I firmly think they were one of the better teams in the country. I’m biased. But somebody else, Dayton was one of the first four out.

“Look at what UCLA did as an 11-seed [in 2021], what Virginia Commonwealth did as an 11-seed [in 2011], what Syracuse did as an 11-seed [in 2018]. Those are three teams that played [in the First Four] in Dayton and went to the Final Four eventually. It should broaden our thinking.”

 

[CL82]

So no mention of removing autobids, but of expanding the field again.

Those things are not mutually exclusive.

 

[Ha Who]

Don’t worry everyone. It is inevitable it will happen? But inevitably gaily. Just study big business failures

 

[auror]

Those things are not mutually exclusive.

Sure but no mention here, a sourced reporting saying he's aware of potential backlash, and a previous reporting that other small school people on the original call thought those who were up in arms were misconstruing things.

It's what we expect based on fear and continuation of football machinations, but there's no actual evidence anyone is even talking about doing it.

 

[CL82]

Sure but no mention here, a sourced reporting saying he's aware of potential backlash, and a previous reporting that other small school people on the original call thought those who were up and arms were misconstruing things.

It's what we expect based on fear and continuation of football machinations, but there's no actual evidence anyone is even talking about doing it.

My guess is that the greater inclusivity won’t be based upon auto qualifiers, but rather, a higher number of invites based upon the teams record including both win loss and, importantly, strength of competition. With the SEC in the Big Ten becoming mega conferences they will be playing fewer opponents outside of their conference. Therefore, it will be harder for schools outside those conferences to play opponents with high SOS rankings. So, the greater inclusivity will be more P2 teams. That’s just a guess, but it fits everything he said up to this date.

 

[huskymedic]

 

[McLovin]

Yuck. Watering it down with barely over .500 teams like Mississippi State and Penn State just to get more power conference teams in is almost as bad as eliminating the auto bid.

 

[shizzle787]

As long as they don’t get rid of AQs, I could live with the tournament going to 72 even though I wish it went back to 64.

 

[ThabeetDown]

I wish Sankey nothing but the worse. Greedy [insert expletive here]. Don't they get enough money from ruining college sports with football? Does he really need to screw up the NCAA Tournament too?

 

[uconndogs]

I wish Sankey nothing but the worse. Greedy [insert expletive here]. Don't they get enough money from ruining college sports with football? Does he really need to screw up the NCAA Tournament too?

I understand the sentiment, but he's simply doing his job. His job is to represent the conference and its members and a big part of that is optimizing the financial take for those members. The construct of college athletics is now fully that of professional franchises. That train has left the station and there is no turning back.

 

[auror]

MAAC commissioner: Don't mess with the NCAA Tournament

Lacey resident and Ocean County lifer Rich Ensor on the state of college sports as he heads into his record-setting 35th and final season at the helm.

www.app.com

SEC commissioner Greg Sankey made waves recently by suggesting major changes to the March Madness format. Ensor has known Sankey, who hails from upstate New York and once helmed a mid-major conference, for decades.

“He says things like that because he’s got people he’s got to deal with,” Ensor said. “He doesn’t want to mess with the basketball tournament.”

As Ensor pointed out, what really irked Sankey was perceived slights against the SEC by the NCAA baseball tournament selection committee (college baseball is huge in the southeast). The inference: rattle your saber about the basketball tournament, get your way with baseball tournament expansion.

“It’s a leverage thing,” Ensor said.
...
(High-major commissioners) hear that from their media partners, by the way -- ‘Don’t mess with something that’s working really well.' These schools keep it interesting, otherwise those first couple of rounds would be boring.”

 

[AZHuskiePop]

While I don’t see an end to the current auto bid format anytime soon (maybe optimistically) there is a pretty clear path for the BIG and SEC to destroy the NCAA tournament. And it may just happen as collateral damage is the attempt to breakaway / negotiating over more power for football.

Yes, the NCAA tournament makes the NCAA $1B every year. But in 2019 only $170 million was actually paid out to the conferences / schools in it. NCAA kept the rest (I assume to “support” other non-revenue sports)

Even if the BIG and SEC currently gets 50% of that (they don’t), that’s only $65 million.

It’s not crazy to think a new tournament could fetch more than that for the super conferences if they took it to market. Even if they set aside some money to payout other non-super conference schools who participate.

If your goal is getting more money from a goose that lays golden eggs killing it is not the way you go about it . You may just end up with a down pillow.
The solution is to get more golden eggs
A current NCAA unit about $350,000
so an intelligent person will look at that and say there are two ways to get more golden eggs

1 increase the annual unit
2 increase the number of units my conference earns
It’s really not as complicated as you think
A Quick examination tells you that 1/2 the net proceeds let’s say $400,000,000 are distributed between 1500 member institutions. Almost any number divided by 1500 become insignificant into today world.
By just eliminating that distribution adds that total to the current $170,000,000 increasing each unit worth to over $1,000,000 each that’s a huge windfall without even a tweek to the tourney.

 

[EBonz30]

Listen I love the NCAA tournament just as much as anyone else but it has ruined the regular season & the importance of it. Adding more teams will just make the regular season worse.

 

[freescooter]

Listen I love the NCAA tournament just as much as anyone else but it has ruined the regular season & the importance of it. Adding more teams will just make the regular season worse.

Right. With rare exceptions regular season games for major and P5 leagues are completely meaningless. They are basically 20 games to seed an equally meaningless league tournament. If you add more at large teams it just means it becomes even more meaningless.

 

[Chief00]

Never have things been so money driven, and things have always been money driven.

 

[XLCenterFan]

These idiots will ruin anything. The bracket, as is (we could probably do without the "first four," but fine, leave it), is one of the finest, most-anticipated, and well-devised sporting events ever. I haven't felt the need to protest much in my life, but I'd be leading the charge to the doors of NCAA HQ if they go messing with it. Although I would NOT go all Jan.6 style...let's not get carried away. I would get rid of league tourneys and spice up regular season match ups.

 

[AZHuskiePop]

These idiots will ruin anything. The bracket, as is (we could probably do without the "first four," but fine, leave it), is one of the finest, most-anticipated, and well-devised sporting events ever. I haven't felt the need to protest much in my life, but I'd be leading the charge to the doors of NCAA HQ if they go messing with it. Although I would NOT go all Jan.6 style...let's not get carried away. I would get rid of league tourneys and spice up regular season match ups.

I don’t think NCAA headquarters is calling the shots.

 

[HooperScooper]

97% of the roughly 100 coaches polled by CBSSports.com said leave the qualifying bids as they are. Interesting. You might think more P5 coaches would say no more automatic bids which gives their school a better chance of qualifying each year.

Candid Coaches: Should the NCAA Tournament stay as is with automatic bids, or go to an all at-large format?

The Big Dance hasn't seen a change in more than a decade, so what's the point in tweaking a near-perfect event?

www.cbssports.com

 

[shizzle787]

97% of the roughly 100 coaches polled by CBSSports.com said leave the qualifying bids as they are. Interesting. You might think more P5 coaches would say no more automatic bids which gives their school a better chance of qualifying each year.

Candid Coaches: Should the NCAA Tournament stay as is with automatic bids, or go to an all at-large format?

The Big Dance hasn't seen a change in more than a decade, so what's the point in tweaking a near-perfect event?

www.cbssports.com

Great article. I agree with all of it. They need to leave the format alone.

 

[Rico444]

People tend to overuse the phrase "This will ruin the sport!" whenever there is a new rule or format introduced.

That being said, making big changes to the NCAA tournament would absolutely ruin the sport.