Two more bad ideas from Steve

[SWC75]

I’m a guy who likes to re-imagine things and, typically, my ideas are not well-received. There are always many reasons why they are bad ideas, no matter how much I like them. But I post them anyway in case they might plant a seed in some people’s minds somewhere behind their aghastness. Even if it doesn’t, posting my ideas allows them to pass from my mind into the river of discussions on the internet and my mind can move on to other things. But don’t worry: the powers that be have never looked at one of my posts and said “Hey! Let’s do that!”

I don’t like:
- The meaninglessness of the post-season NIT, which hasn’t prevented it from continuing to exist.
- The fact that games played in November and December seem to matter more than the games played in January and February. Traditionally, a basketball coach is building his team into what they are going to be in the first two months of the new year and the conference season is real measure of how good they are.
- The fact that conference tournament winners get automatic bids but regular season champs don’t.
- Play-in games and byes. 2-4-8-16-32-64-128. That’s what I appreciate.

I also don’t like teams being in a division that they are never going to be able to win. About half of Division 1 should be in Division II. Either that or there should be four divisions as there are in football. (Of course, half of Division 1 in football should be back in FCS where they came from.) The problem is, it’s basically impossible to move a school down if it does not want to go, unless you create a mathematical system for moving schools up and down, like English soccer teams. But you’d have vote to do that and the hangers-on will vote against it, so that’s not part of this fantasy.

Bad Steve Idea #1

Put an end to the unloved post-season NIT and turn the preseason NIT in a championship of Catholic schools. Here is a list of Catholic Schools that play Division 1 basketball: Boston College,
Canisius, Creighton, Dayton, DePaul, Detroit Mercy, Duquesne, Fairfield, Fordham, Georgetown,
Gonzaga, Holy Cross, Iona, LaSalle, Loyola-Baltimore, Loyola-Chicago, Loyola Marymount,
Loyola-New Orleans, Manhattan, Marist, Marquette, Mount St. Mary’s, Niagara, Notre Dame,
Portland, Providence, Saint Bonaventure, Saint Francis-New York, Saint Francis-Pa, Saint John’s,
Saint Joseph’s, Saint Louis, Saint Mary’s, Saint Peter’s, San Francisco, Santa Clara, Seattle,
Seton Hall, Siena, Villanova and Xavier. That’s 41 teams. Take the top 16 from the previous season, send them all the MSG and play all the games there in November. It could be used to raise money for Catholic Charities. The Cardinal of the NYC Diocese could present the winner’s trophy. That would be a heck of a lot more interesting than what we have now.

Bad Steve Idea #2

For the NCAA tournament, I want to see every regular season conference champion and every conference tournament champion in the NCAA tournament. No more having the 25-6 champion of a one bid conference getting upset by a 15-16 team and having to watch them on TV in the Big Dance. Put both of them in. I’d base the rest of the tournament on conference standings, which would make the conference season and the conference tournament both part of the NCAA tournament. Conferences would get bids based on their regular season standings in a number based on the number of NCAA victories the current conference teams had earned in their history. The current one bid conferences would now be two-bid conferences because their regular season and tournament champs would both get in, (unless that was the same team). Other conferences would get bids for their second-place regular season team, or their top three or four or five, maybe six. I think it would require tie-breakers to determine who is #1, #2, #3, #4, #5, etc. to avoid suspicions that conferences manufactured ties to get more teams in.

Here is the number of NCAA tournament victories won by the teams in each current conference, (totals only to save space):

Atlantic Coast 661 0.18583
Big Ten 497 0.13972
Big 12 447 0.12567
SEC 401 0.11274
Big East 372 0.10458
Pacific Coast 362 0.10177
Atlantic Ten 143 0.04020
American 138 0.03880
West Coast 98 0.02755
Mountain West 79 0.02221
Missouri Valley 48 0.01349
Ivy 45 0.01265
Conference-USA 43 0.01209
Mid-American 33 0.00928
Metro Atlantic 21 0.00590
Patriot 21 0.00590
Big Sky 17 0.00478
Sun Belt 15 0.00422
Big West 14 0.00394
Horizon 14 0.00394
Southern 12 0.00337
Western Athletic 12 0.00337
Atlantic Sun 10 0.00281
Coastal 10 0.00281
Southland 9 0.00253
Southwest Athletic 9 0.00253
Ohio Valley 6 0.00169
Summit 6 0.00169
America East 4 0.00112
Big South 4 0.00112
Mid-Eastern 3 0.00008
Northeast 3 0.00008

That’s 3,557 wins. I’ve put the percentage each conference has contributed next to their total. I’d give the bottom eight conferences automatic bids for their regular season and tournament champion only. The next eight would get their second place team in. The next eight would get their their third place team in. The top eight would get their top fout teams in.

That’s 32 conferences who would all get their regular season and post season champions in, potentially 64 teams. Eight conferences would get their second-place team in, pushing it to 72 teams. Eight conferences would get their top three teams in. Now it’s 88. Eight conferences would get their top 4 teams in, pushing it to 112. It would actually be less than that because the conference tournament would often be won by teams that already had automatic bids, but you’re not going to get it down to 64 teams so the NCAA tournament would have to expand to 128 teams to accommodate this.

The entire division, (358 teams) should be ranked by each mathematical system and the results collated, (just like a poll of writers or coaches). The teams that don’t get automatic invites would be invited based on the math to fill out the field. No “blind resumes”, "quads" or “behind closed doors” decision making. It’s all conference standings, the conference tournament and the math. Teams would know what they have to do and where they stand. The math would then be used to seed them. We’ll need to go to 128 but that’s only 36% of the division, less than the 62% of football teams that go to bowl games and it’s only one extra round. You’re down to 64 teams after that one round.

I know: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it? But what if it can be done better?

Now my mind can move on to something else.

 

[OttoinGrotto]

There are no bad Steves, only bad ideas.

 

[domestu]

You put a lot of work into your posts but I'm not sure many college hoops fans will ever go for a 128 team NCAA Tournament. Colgate is the only member of the Patriot Conference that had a winning record during the regular season this year and giving two more schools from that league automatic bids would make the opening round of games meaningless. Expanding the tournament like this might appeal to the NCAA members from the minor conferences, but it would probably lead the major hoops conferences to break away from the NCAA and hold their own post season tournament.

 

[FireballPhil]

I would venture to say your point two is the reason point three exists. As teams get better throughout the season, it makes sense that the team with the best conference record may not be the best come post season. But in a one game format for a championship game, can that really be determined?

So as far as the NIT, how about this for a stupid idea? Hold the NIT before brackets are released for the NCAA. Yes you would have to push back the NCAA a couple weeks. Using your idea that all conference and tourney champs are auto qualifiers, the best of the rest is invited to the NIT. The NIT can be expanded to whatever size you want, but the end result is say the top 16 teams join the auto qualifiers in the big dance. Use the NIT as a sort of large play in game system. Since they would only be narrowing it down to the top 16 or 32 teams-however many was deemed necessary- a full tournament isn't needed. This gives all the rest one final chance to prove they are one of the best teams regardless of what the net, rpi, whatever metric you want to use says about you.

 

[longtimefan]

I’m a guy who likes to re-imagine things and, typically, my ideas are not well-received. There are always many reasons why they are bad ideas, no matter how much I like them. But I post them anyway in case they might plant a seed in some people’s minds somewhere behind their aghastness. Even if it doesn’t, posting my ideas allows them to pass from my mind into the river of discussions on the internet and my mind can move on to other things. But don’t worry: the powers that be have never looked at one of my posts and said “Hey! Let’s do that!”

I don’t like:
- The meaninglessness of the post-season NIT, which hasn’t prevented it from continuing to exist.
- The fact that games played in November and December seem to matter more than the games played in January and February. Traditionally, a basketball coach is building his team into what they are going to be in the first two months of the new year and the conference season is real measure of how good they are.
- The fact that conference tournament winners get automatic bids but regular season champs don’t.
- Play-in games and byes. 2-4-8-16-32-64-128. That’s what I appreciate.

I also don’t like teams being in a division that they are never going to be able to win. About half of Division 1 should be in Division II. Either that or there should be four divisions as there are in football. (Of course, half of Division 1 in football should be back in FCS where they came from.) The problem is, it’s basically impossible to move a school down if it does not want to go, unless you create a mathematical system for moving schools up and down, like English soccer teams. But you’d have vote to do that and the hangers-on will vote against it, so that’s not part of this fantasy.

Bad Steve Idea #1

Put an end to the unloved post-season NIT and turn the preseason NIT in a championship of Catholic schools. Here is a list of Catholic Schools that play Division 1 basketball: Boston College,
Canisius, Creighton, Dayton, DePaul, Detroit Mercy, Duquesne, Fairfield, Fordham, Georgetown,
Gonzaga, Holy Cross, Iona, LaSalle, Loyola-Baltimore, Loyola-Chicago, Loyola Marymount,
Loyola-New Orleans, Manhattan, Marist, Marquette, Mount St. Mary’s, Niagara, Notre Dame,
Portland, Providence, Saint Bonaventure, Saint Francis-New York, Saint Francis-Pa, Saint John’s,
Saint Joseph’s, Saint Louis, Saint Mary’s, Saint Peter’s, San Francisco, Santa Clara, Seattle,
Seton Hall, Siena, Villanova and Xavier. That’s 41 teams. Take the top 16 from the previous season, send them all the MSG and play all the games there in November. It could be used to raise money for Catholic Charities. The Cardinal of the NYC Diocese could present the winner’s trophy. That would be a heck of a lot more interesting than what we have now.

Bad Steve Idea #2

For the NCAA tournament, I want to see every regular season conference champion and every conference tournament champion in the NCAA tournament. No more having the 25-6 champion of a one bid conference getting upset by a 15-16 team and having to watch them on TV in the Big Dance. Put both of them in. I’d base the rest of the tournament on conference standings, which would make the conference season and the conference tournament both part of the NCAA tournament. Conferences would get bids based on their regular season standings in a number based on the number of NCAA victories the current conference teams had earned in their history. The current one bid conferences would now be two-bid conferences because their regular season and tournament champs would both get in, (unless that was the same team). Other conferences would get bids for their second-place regular season team, or their top three or four or five, maybe six. I think it would require tie-breakers to determine who is #1, #2, #3, #4, #5, etc. to avoid suspicions that conferences manufactured ties to get more teams in.

Here is the number of NCAA tournament victories won by the teams in each current conference, (totals only to save space):

Atlantic Coast 661 0.18583
Big Ten 497 0.13972
Big 12 447 0.12567
SEC 401 0.11274
Big East 372 0.10458
Pacific Coast 362 0.10177
Atlantic Ten 143 0.04020
American 138 0.03880
West Coast 98 0.02755
Mountain West 79 0.02221
Missouri Valley 48 0.01349
Ivy 45 0.01265
Conference-USA 43 0.01209
Mid-American 33 0.00928
Metro Atlantic 21 0.00590
Patriot 21 0.00590
Big Sky 17 0.00478
Sun Belt 15 0.00422
Big West 14 0.00394
Horizon 14 0.00394
Southern 12 0.00337
Western Athletic 12 0.00337
Atlantic Sun 10 0.00281
Coastal 10 0.00281
Southland 9 0.00253
Southwest Athletic 9 0.00253
Ohio Valley 6 0.00169
Summit 6 0.00169
America East 4 0.00112
Big South 4 0.00112
Mid-Eastern 3 0.00008
Northeast 3 0.00008

That’s 3,557 wins. I’ve put the percentage each conference has contributed next to their total. I’d give the bottom eight conferences automatic bids for their regular season and tournament champion only. The next eight would get their second place team in. The next eight would get their their third place team in. The top eight would get their top fout teams in.

That’s 32 conferences who would all get their regular season and post season champions in, potentially 64 teams. Eight conferences would get their second-place team in, pushing it to 72 teams. Eight conferences would get their top three teams in. Now it’s 88. Eight conferences would get their top 4 teams in, pushing it to 112. It would actually be less than that because the conference tournament would often be won by teams that already had automatic bids, but you’re not going to get it down to 64 teams so the NCAA tournament would have to expand to 128 teams to accommodate this.

The entire division, (358 teams) should be ranked by each mathematical system and the results collated, (just like a poll of writers or coaches). The teams that don’t get automatic invites would be invited based on the math to fill out the field. No “blind resumes” or “behind closed doors” decision making. It’s all conference standings, the conference tournament and the math. Teams would know what they have to do and where they stand. The math would then be used to seed them. We’ll need to go to 128 but that’s only 36% of the division, less than the 62% of football teams that go to bowl games and it’s only one extra round. You’re down to 64 teams after that one round.

I know: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it? But what if it can be done better?

Now my mind can move on to something else.

The problem I see is the heavy reliance on conference standings. That works for the Ivy, Patriot, etal., even for the Big East where there is a double round-robin schedule. It doesn't work in the P4. The obscene behemoths of 14-16-18 teams all have unbalanced schedules.

 

[Cuse181]

I’m a guy who likes to re-imagine things and, typically, my ideas are not well-received. There are always many reasons why they are bad ideas, no matter how much I like them. But I post them anyway in case they might plant a seed in some people’s minds somewhere behind their aghastness. Even if it doesn’t, posting my ideas allows them to pass from my mind into the river of discussions on the internet and my mind can move on to other things. But don’t worry: the powers that be have never looked at one of my posts and said “Hey! Let’s do that!”

I don’t like:
- The meaninglessness of the post-season NIT, which hasn’t prevented it from continuing to exist.
- The fact that games played in November and December seem to matter more than the games played in January and February. Traditionally, a basketball coach is building his team into what they are going to be in the first two months of the new year and the conference season is real measure of how good they are.
- The fact that conference tournament winners get automatic bids but regular season champs don’t.
- Play-in games and byes. 2-4-8-16-32-64-128. That’s what I appreciate.

I also don’t like teams being in a division that they are never going to be able to win. About half of Division 1 should be in Division II. Either that or there should be four divisions as there are in football. (Of course, half of Division 1 in football should be back in FCS where they came from.) The problem is, it’s basically impossible to move a school down if it does not want to go, unless you create a mathematical system for moving schools up and down, like English soccer teams. But you’d have vote to do that and the hangers-on will vote against it, so that’s not part of this fantasy.

Bad Steve Idea #1

Put an end to the unloved post-season NIT and turn the preseason NIT in a championship of Catholic schools. Here is a list of Catholic Schools that play Division 1 basketball: Boston College,
Canisius, Creighton, Dayton, DePaul, Detroit Mercy, Duquesne, Fairfield, Fordham, Georgetown,
Gonzaga, Holy Cross, Iona, LaSalle, Loyola-Baltimore, Loyola-Chicago, Loyola Marymount,
Loyola-New Orleans, Manhattan, Marist, Marquette, Mount St. Mary’s, Niagara, Notre Dame,
Portland, Providence, Saint Bonaventure, Saint Francis-New York, Saint Francis-Pa, Saint John’s,
Saint Joseph’s, Saint Louis, Saint Mary’s, Saint Peter’s, San Francisco, Santa Clara, Seattle,
Seton Hall, Siena, Villanova and Xavier. That’s 41 teams. Take the top 16 from the previous season, send them all the MSG and play all the games there in November. It could be used to raise money for Catholic Charities. The Cardinal of the NYC Diocese could present the winner’s trophy. That would be a heck of a lot more interesting than what we have now.

Bad Steve Idea #2

For the NCAA tournament, I want to see every regular season conference champion and every conference tournament champion in the NCAA tournament. No more having the 25-6 champion of a one bid conference getting upset by a 15-16 team and having to watch them on TV in the Big Dance. Put both of them in. I’d base the rest of the tournament on conference standings, which would make the conference season and the conference tournament both part of the NCAA tournament. Conferences would get bids based on their regular season standings in a number based on the number of NCAA victories the current conference teams had earned in their history. The current one bid conferences would now be two-bid conferences because their regular season and tournament champs would both get in, (unless that was the same team). Other conferences would get bids for their second-place regular season team, or their top three or four or five, maybe six. I think it would require tie-breakers to determine who is #1, #2, #3, #4, #5, etc. to avoid suspicions that conferences manufactured ties to get more teams in.

Here is the number of NCAA tournament victories won by the teams in each current conference, (totals only to save space):

Atlantic Coast 661 0.18583
Big Ten 497 0.13972
Big 12 447 0.12567
SEC 401 0.11274
Big East 372 0.10458
Pacific Coast 362 0.10177
Atlantic Ten 143 0.04020
American 138 0.03880
West Coast 98 0.02755
Mountain West 79 0.02221
Missouri Valley 48 0.01349
Ivy 45 0.01265
Conference-USA 43 0.01209
Mid-American 33 0.00928
Metro Atlantic 21 0.00590
Patriot 21 0.00590
Big Sky 17 0.00478
Sun Belt 15 0.00422
Big West 14 0.00394
Horizon 14 0.00394
Southern 12 0.00337
Western Athletic 12 0.00337
Atlantic Sun 10 0.00281
Coastal 10 0.00281
Southland 9 0.00253
Southwest Athletic 9 0.00253
Ohio Valley 6 0.00169
Summit 6 0.00169
America East 4 0.00112
Big South 4 0.00112
Mid-Eastern 3 0.00008
Northeast 3 0.00008

That’s 3,557 wins. I’ve put the percentage each conference has contributed next to their total. I’d give the bottom eight conferences automatic bids for their regular season and tournament champion only. The next eight would get their second place team in. The next eight would get their their third place team in. The top eight would get their top fout teams in.

That’s 32 conferences who would all get their regular season and post season champions in, potentially 64 teams. Eight conferences would get their second-place team in, pushing it to 72 teams. Eight conferences would get their top three teams in. Now it’s 88. Eight conferences would get their top 4 teams in, pushing it to 112. It would actually be less than that because the conference tournament would often be won by teams that already had automatic bids, but you’re not going to get it down to 64 teams so the NCAA tournament would have to expand to 128 teams to accommodate this.

The entire division, (358 teams) should be ranked by each mathematical system and the results collated, (just like a poll of writers or coaches). The teams that don’t get automatic invites would be invited based on the math to fill out the field. No “blind resumes” or “behind closed doors” decision making. It’s all conference standings, the conference tournament and the math. Teams would know what they have to do and where they stand. The math would then be used to seed them. We’ll need to go to 128 but that’s only 36% of the division, less than the 62% of football teams that go to bowl games and it’s only one extra round. You’re down to 64 teams after that one round.

I know: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it? But what if it can be done better?

Now my mind can move on to something else.

You’re right, that’s first idea is pretty bad. Nothing like a religious affiliation based tournament to really rile up the masses in 2024