Expanding the field to 72 or 80 teams

[spiral97]

This demands a poll.  Added one to the top of this thread - knock yourselves out.

[Canned Goods n Ammo]

I like the field in its current format.

No doubt that Cuse got jobbed, but until more 13-16 seeds win, you can't convince me that there is a need for expansion.

Why add a round to the tourney if more teams are just going to get slaughtered? #1 vs. #20 seeds or whatever are all going to be terrible games. 

If you take out Arkansas and replace them with Cuse, bump up the Big East seedings, and bump down the Big Ten seedings, I think the committee did a pretty excellent job.

Obviously those are some misses, but I don't think the problem is the structure.

Some tweaks to the committee are in order, probably not tweaks to the tourney.

The reason why 13-16 seeds don't win is because those teams in those positions are not the top 64 teams in the country...they are winners from dreg conferences around the country.  The tournament has never been about the best 65 teams...more like the best 40 + 25 other teams.  That's why when NIT people say the champion is the 66th best team it is pure folly.

If you expand to 72 or 80, you're actually adding teams 41 through 50 and you would see a lot more upsets in those lower seeds because quality teams are added, not teams in the 100's, 200's that won their conference tournament from some league no one ever heard of.

I guess I understand your theory... but I'm not sure that any of the 20+ teams that would be added would really make the tourney better. Just longer.

I think there is a probably a point of diminishing returns; meaning 3 weekends might be the perfect number for the tourney.

Any longer and you might cheapen it. It's kind of like the NBA playoffs. Do we really need 8 teams from each conference? I understand that there are probably 16 quality teams in the league, but #s 12-16 usually have no chance at winning the title.

[ChicosBailBonds]

>>>>"No expanding the tournament! Presently with 65 teams, team # 66-68 or so bitch and moan about how they should have been in. All expanding the tournament will do is have teams #73-78 bitch and moan about how they should have been in">>>>>


That is exactly right...The High majors that end up on the bubble are calling for expanding the tourney because "their are more teams".  That is a total smoke screen, the teams that have joined are nonfactors.  Simply new members to 1 bid conferences. How many more teams are really part of the debate?  Were IUPUFW and NJIT and the couple dozen other 2000 student commuter schools that have joined over the last 10-15 years the real reason Syracuse not make the tourney?   Well, maybe indirectly because Boeheim scheduled them all for his Novemeber and December home dates.   
Like I said Boeheims scheduling practices slit his own throut becuase the BE was down this year and the conference RPI only brought Syracuses RPI to 50, in years past with a Uconn in the top 5 and the BE with a top 4 conference RPI Syracuses RPI would have been in the 30's or 40's.  Were they better than Illinois, sure but we are splitting hairs, he only need look in the mirror to find the blame.  Put your self as one of the last 3-4-5 teams in or out and you will get disappointed.  this is not the first time this has happened to Boeheim.  Just 5-6 years ago the exact same thing happened to him, And we heard him whine the whole week, bowed out in the 1st round of the NIT if I recall. 

"The teams that have joined are non factors"...Harrison again is totally wrong.  Look at the 70 teams that have joined Division I in the last 22 years and how many NCAA bids they have acquired....if they were non-factors they would have acquired no bids yet we know that is completely untrue.  Never let those facts get in the way Harrison.  Each and every bid they take is a lost bid for someone else.  Would you like the list of teams from the last 22 years?  It's a lot longer then you think.  Belmont ring a bell?  Albany ring a bell?  Oral Roberts ring a bell?  etc, etc, etc

At the end of the day it's coming whether you guys like it or not, it's a matter of economics.  It won't be next year and it won't be 2009 but it's coming...maybe later than sooner but it's coming.

[Dish]

I agree with NotKirkCameron, if you want to get into the NCAA tournament, go out and win your conference tournament (I'm talking to you Syracuse!). It's a golden ticket into the field, and in essence, it is an extension of the NCAA tournament.

The purpose of the tournament is to CROWN A CHAMPION. Adding the 7th-10th teams from the major conferences does nothing to help crown a champion. They aren't giving out "participant" ribbons here.  Diluting the field and the level of play in the early rounds makes no sense.

With the tv contracts and sponsorship deals, there's plenty of money coming in. Duke made $4 million in profit this year on Men's Basketball. North Carolina made $12.5 million in profit.

[NotAnAlum]

I'd vote against the expansion.  There will always be gripping because teams compare themselves to how did make it.  In fact the more you water it down the less important the regular season is (see NBA) and the more complaints a team left out will have.  "We're no more mediocre than team X, Y and Z and they got in."

[ChicosBailBonds]

I agree with NotKirkCameron, if you want to get into the NCAA tournament, go out and win your conference tournament (I'm talking to you Syracuse!). It's a golden ticket into the field, and in essence, it is an extension of the NCAA tournament.

The purpose of the tournament is to CROWN A CHAMPION. Adding the 7th-10th teams from the major conferences does nothing to help crown a champion. They aren't giving out "participant" ribbons here.  Diluting the field and the level of play in the early rounds makes no sense.

With the tv contracts and sponsorship deals, there's plenty of money coming in. Duke made $4 million in profit this year on Men's Basketball. North Carolina made $12.5 million in profit.

The 7th place in the Big East is the same as the 5th place team in the ACC or the 4th place team in the Pac Ten....remember, there are 16 teams in the Big East.

It's nice that those schools made those profits on basketball, most schools are in the red for athletic departments...for example, 4 women's programs made a profit last year...333 did not.  Who covers those losses?  Men's basketball and football.  MU has one profitable sport...Men's hoops...13 unprofitable sports which Men's hoops has to subsidize.  Simply put, there is not plenty of money coming in for the vast majority of schools.

[Harrison]

Chicos post is really funny.
I had originally posted....

That is exactly right...The High majors that end up on the bubble are calling for expanding the tourney because "their are more teams".  That is a total smoke screen, the teams that have joined are nonfactors.  Simply new members to 1 bid conferences. How many more teams are really part of the debate?  Were IUPUFW and NJIT and the couple dozen other 2000 student commuter schools that have joined over the last 10-15 years the real reason Syracuse did not make the tourney?



So he responds with....

"The teams that have joined are non factors"...Harrison again is totally wrong.  Look at the 70 teams that have joined Division I in the last 22 years and how many NCAA bids they have acquired....if they were non-factors they would have acquired no bids yet we know that is completely untrue.  Never let those facts get in the way Harrison.  Each and every bid they take is a lost bid for someone else.  Would you like the list of teams from the last 22 years?  It's a lot longer then you think.  Belmont ring a bell?  Albany ring a bell?  Oral Roberts ring a bell?  etc, etc, etc

That is funny..like I said all these new teams all come from 1 bid conferences and do not hurt Syracuse's or other chances 1 iota.  In fact when the NCAA recently added a conference they added a team to protect the 1 at large bid.   Chicos, Thanks for backing up my point.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Nice try Harrison, but I didn't back up your point.  There are more conference automatic bids now then there were in the past.  There is more parity now, less scholarships now, more teams now.

So when Butler receives and At-Large bid, that takes away a spot.  Do you think if Syracuse played in the Horizon they wouldn't finish first or second?  Please.  Of course they would.

At the end of the day it's coming and everyone can bitch and whine about it, meanwhile MU and other schools will get an infusion of $$$ they desperately need.  It won't happen likely before 2013 (when the CBS deal is up) but I suspect that is when you will see it.  The NCAA is smart, they will the ability to add more games = MORE MONEY.  They can chop up the package and give those early games to ESPN or to a satellite company, etc.  At the end of the day, money makes the world go round and has to pay for these athletic departments.

It's coming, only a matter of time Harrison, only a matter of time.

The salient point remains which you cannot refute.  It is more difficult to get into the tournament in 2007 then it was in 1985 and becomes more and more difficult each year.

[IAmMarquette]

The salient point remains which you cannot refute.  It is more difficult to get into the tournament in 2007 then it was in 1985 and becomes more and more difficult each year.

Which begs the question, is this a bad thing? If it's more difficult to get in, then wouldn't the teams who end up making it naturally be better teams? Isn't that what the tournament is supposed to be about (auto bids notwithstanding) -- the best 65 teams in the country? If it is in fact more difficult to get a bid now than it once was, and will only continue to become more difficult, doesn't the product benefit from showcasing truly the best teams, which would improve from year to year?

Making the NCAAs should be difficult. It should be an accomplishment. Expanding the field merely waters down the product, even as more teams join D-I.

Unfortunately, you're right, and money does make the world go 'round. CBS, the NCAA and everyone else involved no doubt already know this, and since more games = more $$$, I'm afraid that expansion may be inevitable. It's akin to the NFL's decision to play Thursday night games last season. Putting more games on more days takes away from the once-a-week NFL viewing tradtion, and waters down the product through overexposure. The motivation? Money, of course.

[Dish]

Again, the point of the tournament is to CROWN THE BEST TEAM IN THE COUNTRY THE CHAMPION!

It is not to hand out "Hey, we participated!" awards! Adding teams to the tournament does nothing to help this. In fact, it does quite the opposite and hurts the top teams.

College basketball is a business, and like any business climate, the top teams (companies) will make a greater share of the money than the smaller companies. It happens with my local video store trying to compete with Blockbuster, it happens with the Yankees vs the Royals. Since Duke makes $4 million a year in men's basketball, and Winthrop only makes $100,000 in profit, does this mean we should start increasing the amount of tournament games to offset this and make it equal? Heck no!

What about some side effects of increasing the tournament?
-Coaches salaries continue to rise as more teams make the tournament
-Spending on men's programs increases. Does the increase in tournament games offset/equal this increase?
-The college football pundits will be out to argue "Hey, if these basketball players are missing more class time for an extra week of the tournament, why can't we have a college football tournament"
-The inevitable downward value of the cost of broadcast packages. The tipping point is coming soon, not just for the NCAA men's package, but for MLB and yes, even the NFL. We're at or near the ceiling now of what these networks will pay for packages, even with the absurd amounts being spent.

[mu_hilltopper]

Again, the point of the tournament is to CROWN THE BEST TEAM IN THE COUNTRY THE CHAMPION!

It is not to hand out "Hey, we participated!" awards! Adding teams to the tournament does nothing to help this. In fact, it does quite the opposite and hurts the top teams.

Yes, but to an extent, it is "we participated!" .. there are at 2, perhaps 3 dozen teams that are really there to fill out the brackets for the big boys to march over in their "Crowning."

It's one part "participation" .. one part "Crowning" .. and one big part m-o-n-e-y.

[ChicosBailBonds]

The salient point remains which you cannot refute.  It is more difficult to get into the tournament in 2007 then it was in 1985 and becomes more and more difficult each year.

Which begs the question, is this a bad thing? If it's more difficult to get in, then wouldn't the teams who end up making it naturally be better teams? Isn't that what the tournament is supposed to be about (auto bids notwithstanding) -- the best 65 teams in the country? If it is in fact more difficult to get a bid now than it once was, and will only continue to become more difficult, doesn't the product benefit from showcasing truly the best teams, which would improve from year to year?

Making the NCAAs should be difficult. It should be an accomplishment. Expanding the field merely waters down the product, even as more teams join D-I.

Unfortunately, you're right, and money does make the world go 'round. CBS, the NCAA and everyone else involved no doubt already know this, and since more games = more $$$, I'm afraid that expansion may be inevitable. It's akin to the NFL's decision to play Thursday night games last season. Putting more games on more days takes away from the once-a-week NFL viewing tradtion, and waters down the product through overexposure. The motivation? Money, of course.

19% of teams make it to the NCAA Tournament overall.  When you take away all of the automatic bids (sans the one your team is eligible for) which MU cannot win, then Marquette and every other team in America has a 10.38% chance of getting into the NCAA tournament and the number gets smaller.

I don't disagree with you that there is a concern of watering down the field...my point is that you aren't watering down the field.  By expanding it you are adding more quality teams, not the dregs from the small conference auto bids.  You're adding teams that can actually win some games.  I don't think adding 8 teams or 15 teams is going to dilute the tournament.  If it was the right decision in 1985 to increase it so 24% of teams got in, why is it not the right decision today when only 19% get in (and really the number is 10.38% for each individual team)?  There were people that bitched when it went from 32 to 48 and again when it went from 48 to 64.  Somehow, miraculously, the sport survived....AND THRIVED.

[Eye]

They aren't giving out "participant" ribbons here.

The NC2A is all about giving out participation ribbons.

[spiral97]

They aren't giving out "participant" ribbons here.

The NC2A is all about giving out participation ribbons.

Just ask how people feel about Marquette going to the final four.  If you tell them it doesn't count since the tourney is only about crowning a winner and everything else is worthless then I'll bet you get a LOT more disagreement than agreement.

[maxpower773]

I didn't see if someone pointed this out yet but, just count down from 80 or 72 teams...you get 5 and 9. Not quite the even numbers you'd need, what do you do with those, get rid of one of the teams? The only way to get a final four is to have 128 teams, which is too big of a field. Even if having 72 or so teams would make for a better tournament, it just isn't feasible with needing 4 teams in the end.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Max, that is why you would need play in games of some kind to make the math work.  Just like in the old days when there were 48 teams...not everyone played that first round.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Interesting article


http://www.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070313/SPORTS09/703130340/1007/SPORTS

[maxpower773]

Max, that is why you would need play in games of some kind to make the math work.  Just like in the old days when there were 48 teams...not everyone played that first round.

Ok, I see how that'd work. Now the problem with that is the same problem you have with the play in game now. The teams don't feel apart of the tournament, but even worse is they have to win more games than a team seeded in the official first round.  I've already heard enough about the play in game winner having to play an extra game, and thats a 16 seed. Just think if it was Arkansas or Illinois, they'd complain more than Bo Ryan.

[Dish]

You're missing my point. As presently constructed, the tournament is fine (perfect in my opinion) and being in the Final 4 is obviously a huge accomplishment. My point was that by EXPANDING the tournament, just so teams can say "hey, we participated" is stupid in my opinion. Yes, any time you have a competitive tournament, the point or goal is to win the tournament. (Beckon the voice of Herm Edwards if need be). Qualifying for the tournament as it is presently constructed is an accomplishment.

[Avenue Commons]

The way to do it would be to add three more play in games. Make the "lower" conferences play one another in these play in games for the chance to face a #1 seed. That would allow for 3 more at large bids. Wouldn't be a huge expansion, but would eliminate the nonsense that we saw with Syracuse. They should have been in. There shouldn't even be an argument about it.