This is the weekend when a number of non-Power 5 conferences have their conference tournaments while the big boys end the seemingly unending regular season. This is a time when automatic bids are earned and a lot of marginal teams begin to sweat their chances to advance to the Big Dance.
We know that the Power 5 leagues will once again dominate the minds of the NCAA Men’s College Basketball Selection Committee. In many instances, that is a logical way to proceed.
However, those on the committee must not forget the runs of the eventual champion University of Connecticut, Florida Atlantic University, the University of Miami and San Diego State University in the previous tournament. That would be a #4 seed (UConn); two #5 seeds (UM and SDSU); and a #9 seed (FAU). If they want to make a truly competitive tournament, then deference must be given to champions and other teams from conferences like the Sun Belt, WAC and Ivy League—these teams can flat out play and the Power 5 schools tend to avoid playing those conferences lest they are upset and suffer a Quad 2 or 3 loss and damage their resume.
I look at a one school conference like the America East Conference and see perennial league power Vermont atop the regular season standings. Last season the Catamounts were a #15 seed and gave Marquette a battle in the opening round. This year, UVM has a win over Ivy League co-leader Yale and some close losses to good mid-major teams. Without winning the tournament, they go home. And even if UVM does make it to the Dance, will they be sequestered in a #15 slot again despite a 28-6 record.
The same applies to High Point of the Big South; Charleston of the Colonial Athletic; Oakland out of the Horizon League; Sam Houston in Conference USA; Quinnipiac from the MAAC; Akron in the MAC; SoCon’s Samford; 28-3 Mc Neese State, the runaway champ in the Southland; and the leaders in the Big Sky, Big West, Northeast and Ohio Valley Conferences among others—win or go home. Not that any of these schools realistically has a shot at the title, but great seasons can only end up in the National Invitational Tournament, which is on its last legs.
It gets complicated with other conferences. Let’s start with the Ivy League. For much of the regular season, Cornell, Princeton and Yale have been in a dead heat for the lead. Princeton has put together a stellar 23-3 record, even if the losses all came in league play and the non-conference schedule was not extraordinarily challenging. Remember that the Tigers beat #2 seed Arizona and #7 Missouri before falling to Creighton in last year’s Sweet Sixteen.
Yale and Cornell did not fare particularly well versus better programs —should that be held against the as both teams did not suffer more than eight losses should either win the league playoff? No one expected much from Princeton—and how did that work out?
Moreover, if Princeton was to lose to either school and not win the Ivy automatic bid, should they not receive strong consideration for an at-large berth which might normally go to a team which finished atop above .500 in a power conference? If track records speak for themselves, then Princeton could make it into the tournament—as a regular seed or in a play-in game.
I have been following James Madison University. Coming off a marvelous season in football and making a bowl game, the Dukes have starred in the Sun Belt Conference while amassing a 28-3 record. The problem for JMU is that Appalachian State went 16-2 in the league with a 26-5 record, one game ahead of its rival and earning the conference tournament top seed. ASU defeated JMU twice. JMU won its opener on the road at Michigan State, a team on the ropes for selection into the Dance.
So what to do if JMU loses one more time to App State? Are they relegated to the NIT while Michigan State makes the NCAA’s? I hope not.
While FAU finished second in the AAC to South Florida, both schools merit a place in the tournament. Is the Atlantic 10 a three team invite with Richmond, Loyola and Dayton? Does the strength of the Missouri Valley Conference allow for Indiana State, Drake and Bradley all to go? Ditto in the Mountain West with Utah State, Nevada and Boise State?
Is the venerable ACC only going to send its historically best schools—Duke and North Carolina—or do overrated schools like UVA, Pitt, Clemson and Syracuse get nods instead of somebody from a lesser conference? Could the Big 12 send as many as eight schools? Should Seton Hall, Providence, St. John’s and Rick Pitino and Villanova receive more appreciation?
What about the Big Ten? Is Purdue really a top seed? Look at their post-season record and it is evident that they receive too much credit. Eight schools from the Big Ten are too many. In its last run in the NCAA’s, the Pac-12 should only send three teams, although Oregon at 11-8 is going to get a big look see. No more than six from the SEC, please, while Mississippi State, Texas A&M and LSU are lurking dangerous close to .500 in league play. And please consider Santa Clara from the WCC to join St. Mary’s, Gonzaga and San Francisco.
There are only 68 slots to be filled. Nothing I have laid out accounts for the biggest wild card of them all. Upsets in confidence tournaments. Those happenings wreak havoc and end up excluding teams which, other face, would normally be worthy of a spot in the draw.
I have heard talk of expanding the size of the field. How the NCAA would go about that is unclear. Would teams on the bubble have a better opportunity to receive a place in the Big Dance? Would the big boys once more receive greater preference or will the smaller guys actually get seat at the men’s basketball table? No matter what, there always will be some team left out in the cold, with an aggrieved fan section.
In about a week, we will have the field. Will it be replete with surprises or just have the usual suspects in the usual places, over seeded and ready to fail once more? Or is that the beauty of the flawed being known as the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Championship?
Staying with the money maker known as collegiate basketball, little did my wife, two college friends and I have an idea that seeing Penn defeat Dartmouth would have some meaning later this year. These two teams finished far behind their Ivy League brethren.
But that’s not the real story. The Dartmouth team has voted to form the first labor union for college athletes. A lot has to happen to make this a reality. When it does, the entire landscape of college athletics will change. As will the NCAA, if that organization survives the pillory at the hands of the SEC and Big Ten in football.
When Northwestern football players unsuccessfully tried to unionize, their failure was scoffed at. Now, more than likely, we observers of collegiate sports are at the precipice of something huge, with undetermined outcomes. This story bears close watching as it unfolds.
For now, we have basketball on our radar. Whether it is setting the DIII Final Four (Hampden-Sydney plays Guilford and Trinity and Trine tangle on the men’s side while NYU goes against Transylvania and Smith and Wartburg meet on the women’s side) or watching the conferences determine champions for men and women, there is no more exciting time for college athletics.
Sure, the Boston Celtics hit a rough patch in losing two straight to Cleveland, after blowing a 22 point fourth quarter lead, and then to Denver with Nikola Jokic just dominant for the defending champs. And sure, Steph Curry rolled another ankle late in the season, jeopardizing the Warriors chances to make the playoffs. And yes, the Yankees’ season opener is less than three weeks away.
So what. It is tourney time, baby!
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