In the short term mid-majors wont be hurt, but in the long term I think think the divide between major and mid-major will grow. Right now the best mid-majors are quite a bit better than the worst major program teams, and I dont think that will be the case once the super-confrences are formed and all the best talent decides to play for those schools.
There are a lot of reason why I think mid-majors can continue to be relevant in CBB, even though they are biting the dust in CFB, here are the major ones:
- There's enough talent to go around. If you look at some of the best mid-major players over the last five years or so they were nobodies coming out of high school that didn't get high-major offers. Jimmer got no love from the Big East, Curry couldn't get a VPI offer, Leonard couldn't get a PAC-10 offer, the list goes on. The thing with basketball is you only need to find that 1 guy to surround with solid role players to compete at a national level. This isn't the case with football. Even BSU and TCU are pulling 3 and 4 star talent on a regular basis, every other D1 team that can't recruit high-major talent is irrelevant, that's not the case with CBB.
- I think good coaching helps you elevate a team much more in CBB than in CFB, keeping the mid-majors relevant. Let's face it, even with Kiffin (I consider him a bum) at the helm of USC, we lose that game to USC at lease 95 out of 100 times, with a great coach. In CBB, you put up a well coached team with decent players and you'll always have a lot better chance against the big boys. There are a ton of great coaches at the mid-majors, which will always keep them competitive on the national stage.
- The NCAA tournament always makes a good mid-major team relevant and that just makes them more fun to watch. I'm guessing I'm not the only fan that watches Xavier battle Temple on ESPNU rather than Duke blow out Virginia on ESPN. The most excited I got last season for a non-SU game was BYU vs SDSU in late January. Add that to how they effect the bubble for the big programs and there's reason for the media to pay attention, unlike in football.
- In CFB, you really only have 2 relevant mid-majors (TCU and BSU), with them, it's one strike and they become irrelevant. In CBB there are dozens of good mid-majors who have the ability to make Cinderella runs.
I think when you take these factors they'll keep mid-major CBB a heck of a lot more relevant than mid-major CFB and I think we'll still see the best mid-majors teams be significantly better than the worse high-majors.