NCAA Tourney Expansion?

[FrancoPizza]

They can keep it at 64, just reserved the last four spots for another 64 teams to compete, the "final 4" of the "bubble tournament" becomes the last 4 of the 64. The bubble tournament is the NIT.

Heck no. There’s already too many games as it is.

26 regular season games was beautiful.

 

[jncuse]

Every time this comes up, I think back to this Onion March Madness bit... apparently from 2009 as I watch this now. Can't wait for the Kukodo vs the Nevada School of Gambling matchup.

 

[sufandu]

April Madness?

April Absurdity?

 

[OrangeXtreme]

Back when the tournament expanded to 64 teams, there were only 280 D1 schools. Roughly 23% made the tourney.

Now there are over 350 teams.

Even if you expand to only 80 teams, now you're looking at 16 play-in games just to get back to 64.

And you think finding TruTV is tough...

 

[Dick_in_MI]

It could be worse. If you are a P5 football team and get to a 6-6 record (perhaps beating up a few G5 schools), you go to a bowl. Fans now consider a 6-win season to be successful, when in reality you are getting a participation trophy. Even a couple of 5-7 teams get to bowls because there are too many bowls, and they get the "successful season"/participation trophy designation as well.

It is fun for the fans I suppose and helps a mediocre coach keep his job, but it really doesn't reward performance at all.

 

[NineOneSeven]

I like 68. Do not have strong opinions on expanding but 96 would be way too much. You’d end up with many teams barely over .500. Unless the goal is to use most of those spots for mid major additions.

 

[RandygoCuse]

Part of me would like to try FA cup style and let everyone in. I'd only seed the top 64, the rest are assigned randomly. C'mon, just try it one year and see how people like it...

 

[Hoo's That]

That would be the one argument for it. But when you look at the bottom 50 or so teams, one could question if they really should be playing Division 1 anyway.

They're in D-1 strictly for the b-ball money. Just about every, if not every, one-bid conference is an amalgam of former D-2 and D-3 teams.

 

[Hoo's That]

It could be worse. If you are a P5 football team and get to a 6-6 record (perhaps beating up a few G5 schools), you go to a bowl. Fans now consider a 6-win season to be successful, when in reality you are getting a participation trophy. Even a couple of 5-7 teams get to bowls because there are too many bowls, and they get the "successful season"/participation trophy designation as well.

It is fun for the fans I suppose and helps a mediocre coach keep his job, but it really doesn't reward performance at all.

But is does fill some air time on ESPN and hotel rooms and restaurant seats that would otherwise be vacant in the host cities. Why else go to Shreveport in December?

 

[FrancoPizza]

Back when the tournament expanded to 64 teams, there were only 280 D1 schools. Roughly 23% made the tourney.

Now there are over 350 teams.

Even if you expand to only 80 teams, now you're looking at 16 play-in games just to get back to 64.

And you think finding TruTV is tough...

Why are we obsessed with the percentage? They just keep adding crap teams to D1. If we’re talking about some European powerhouse additions then maybe reevaluate.

If all these new additions from IAA are complaining about access, then go back to the lower division!

Expanding the field any more will turn this into a participation trophy exercise.

 

[upperdeck]

I would be fine with 2 play in games in each quad. 4 #16s get a chance to win a game that would be like 4 more teams I think?

 

[Orangezoo]

Part of me would like to try FA cup style and let everyone in. I'd only seed the top 64, the rest are assigned randomly. C'mon, just try it one year and see how people like it...

So this take is kind of like the change from goDuke to goCuse...

 

[Dick_in_MI]

But is does fill some air time on ESPN and hotel rooms and restaurant seats that would otherwise be vacant in the host cities. Why else go to Shreveport in December?

Which is the only reason some of those bowls even exit; to help out the chamber of commerce in some city. I mean, why would anyone go to Shreveport regardless of the month?

A team can win 3 of their OOC games against soup cans from a G5 conference, lose their OOC game against a P5 team, go 3-5 against their conference opponents, and that sterling season says they were successful and can go to a bowl. Sure, whatever.

 

[mscanlo]

They can keep it at 64, just reserved the last four spots for another 64 teams to compete, the "final 4" of the "bubble tournament" becomes the last 4 of the 64. The bubble tournament is the NIT.

Just to clarify your idea, you are talking about running a set of 4-16 team tournaments for the lower ranked teams, with the winner of each getting the last 4 bids (i.e. like a qualifier tournament)

That's an interesting idea. I know they use a qualifiers in several sports (e.g. tennis, etc.).

64 qualifier might be a little large, but running expanding to 4 sets of a 4-team qualifier (i.e. 16 teams in total, bringing the tournament to 76 teams), might be interesting. The teams play at the same site of the official first round on the tue/wed (that might be a little tight), or do you announce the qualifier tournament ahead of time, so that they can play Sun/Tue (for the thur first round games) and Mon/Wed (for the friday first round matchups)?

Obviously, the qualifiers would be focal to just expand the tournament to 76 teams overall