Here's how I'd do it

Regular Season conference champs (get the bye)
Tournament champ (Ivy does SOME form of postseason)

The at-large field:

Winning conference record
20 wins OR single-digit loses
Top half of conference standings

Use RPI to add/subtract from field

Rather than saying take both the regular season and conference tourney champ, you might as well say you should just take the top 2 teams from each conference. That way there is no penalty to the conference if 1 team wins both.

With that said, that does not leave room for many more at-large teams, which is probably fine. If you start taking teams that finished 6-12 as an at an at large, you might as well let everybody in.

Really that's the question. Who beyond the 68 teams selected now deserve to get in. If you are arguing the regular season conference champs should get in over the tourney champs, why don't single-bid conferences just designate that their regular season champ gets the auto bid?

To your last question: tourneys are license to print $
A winning conference record is a prerequisite to be at-large team
If a regular season champ wins the tournament: another at-large team

Meh, it's probably a sign why the tourney has not expanded to 96, but your proposed field does not excite me. 2 teams from single-bid conferences is just getting overly greedy. Those lame bottom level conferences should feel lucky to even get 1 team get an auto-bid, they certainly don't deserve 2 teams, even if the field was expanded to 96.

At best the tourney could maybe justify expanding to 72 teams, but even that feels like a stretch. The only reason I would argue for 72 is that way every 16 seed would have to win 1 game first to play the 1 seed. Since a 16 seed has never ever beat a 1 seed, that has always been proof to me those bottom 4 seeds don't deserve a spot in the tourney. By expanding to 72, odds are better that a 16 will beat a 1 seed at least once in a while.

The Tourney should never expand beyond 80. There's always gonna be a 69th team or 81st team that gets shafted and there will always be teams left out that could make a run, most certainly including this year. Except for the very bottom feeders and most of the Ivy League, everyone has access to the national title, even as late as February.

I know that so many 26-5 teams get left out of the tournament because they lost in their conference tournament. This would get those teams in.

Pass. I think 64 is a good number. I'm not a fan of the "First Four" either.

This proposal would force teams to schedule lesser teams so they could get to 20 wins.

There would be little, if any, additional TV revenue. Just a bunch of games no one is going to watch.

(03-10-2016 03:14 AM)DavidSt Wrote:  I know that so many 26-5 teams get left out of the tournament because they lost in their conference tournament. This would get those teams in.

And how many of those 26-5 teams go on to win the NIT now? Or even make it to the NIT final 4? There is not a lot of evidence to suggest they would do much in the NCAA tourney.

Usually the highest ranked teams left out are around #33 in RPI or KenPom or whatever you want to use. Usually those highest ranked teams left out are from power conferences. Usually the NIT finals end up having 2 P5 teams.

There is nothing to suggest those 26-5 teams are getting screwed by the NCAA tourney. Really it's their own conference that screwed them by giving away their auto-bid to the conference tourney winner instead of it's regular season winner.

64 is plenty of teams for the NCAA tournament, IMO.

Love the idea of regular season conference champs getting in, I also love the idea of a play in game for all 16 seeds. It would make the eventual 16 vs 1 more interesting while increasing the odds of a 16 knocking off a 1. To make the conference tournaments more interesting, if your regular season and conference champs, you get a bye to the round of 64. If you don't win both, bye's will be determined by a sos/rpi formula. This way your not punishing the P5 and multi bid conferences but you leave a giant carrot out there for low and mid majors.

The NIT loses its auto bid but that is a joke anyways. If anything, this would help kill off the CBI and CIT.

A 96-team NCAA field is awful. The only reason why it was even considered in the first place was to get more middling power conference teams into the field to make more money for the big boys. It was certainly NOT to provide a way for smaller conferences to double up on regular season and conference tournament champs taking bids. That in and of itself is a deal killer for the powers that be that control college sports.

Regardless, the 68-team field is plenty large enough. I'm fine with the First Four because the number of conferences and Division I teams have expanded over the past 20 years and it was a way to alleviate the increase in auto-bids. The size and pace of the NCAA Tournament as an event is just about perfect - it always boggles my mind how much people think it would be a good idea to mess with it.

(03-10-2016 08:13 AM)goofus Wrote:  And how many of those 26-5 teams go on to win the NIT now? Or even make it to the NIT final 4? There is not a lot of evidence to suggest they would do much in the NCAA tourney.

Usually the highest ranked teams left out are around #33 in RPI or KenPom or whatever you want to use. Usually those highest ranked teams left out are from power conferences. Usually the NIT finals end up having 2 P5 teams.

There is nothing to suggest those 26-5 teams are getting screwed by the NCAA tourney. Really it's their own conference that screwed them by giving away their auto-bid to the conference tourney winner instead of it's regular season winner.

Being snubbed from the NCAA's and success in the NIT has little correlation with one another anymore than a 12-seed taking out a 5-seed. It's all about matchups, timing, survive and advance, etc...

(03-10-2016 11:21 AM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  A 96-team NCAA field is awful. The only reason why it was even considered in the first place was to get more middling power conference teams into the field to make more money for the big boys. It was certainly NOT to provide a way for smaller conferences to double up on regular season and conference tournament champs taking bids. That in and of itself is a deal killer for the powers that be that control college sports.

Regardless, the 68-team field is plenty large enough. I'm fine with the First Four because the number of conferences and Division I teams have expanded over the past 20 years and it was a way to alleviate the increase in auto-bids. The size and pace of the NCAA Tournament as an event is just about perfect - it always boggles my mind how much people think it would be a good idea to mess with it.

No one seeded below 8 has ever won the NCAA Tournament. And that only happened once. Only 4 teams seeded lower than 4 have won the national title. Less than 10 have even made the national title game (maybe as little as 5-7 without doing the research) and about 10 teams seeded 8 or lower overall have made the Final Four.

There's no need to expand a field for teams that don't usually factor into the national title hunt. The last 4 in and last 4 out are usually interchangeable.

My proposal is an 88 team field arrived at as follows.

Identify the top 10-12 conferences that usually produce at least one at large entry. Give these conferences a total of 56 spots in the round of 64 which starts at the same time as the current tournament.

Then, have a separate selection committee select from the remaining 20-22 conferences a field of 32 teams, which includes all conference champions and the rest at-large selections (which presumably would provide a Plan B for the better regular season champs upset in their CCG). These conferences would be required to finish their regular season plus CCG one week earlier. These 32 play two rounds prior to Selection Sunday to produce the remaining 8 teams for the round of 64.

Those 8 teams would be seeded by the selection committee just like the other 56 are.

This gives the little guys a chance at winning early round games that are now out of their reach because they have to face a Goliath in the first round. And, it opens up the real possibility of a #1 or #2 seed falling in their first round.

(03-10-2016 11:03 AM)Shox Wrote:  Love the idea of regular season conference champs getting in, I also love the idea of a play in game for all 16 seeds. It would make the eventual 16 vs 1 more interesting while increasing the odds of a 16 knocking off a 1. To make the conference tournaments more interesting, if your regular season and conference champs, you get a bye to the round of 64. If you don't win both, bye's will be determined by a sos/rpi formula. This way your not punishing the P5 and multi bid conferences but you leave a giant carrot out there for low and mid majors.

The NIT loses its auto bid but that is a joke anyways. If anything, this would help kill off the CBI and CIT.

As long as teams are willing to write checks to host games, the CBI and CIT will survive, though I could see them merging into a 32-team tournament since they seem somewhat redundant (yes, the CBI allows sub-.500 teams and power-conference schools, but there's usually only one or two of those anyway).

What would kill it or force it to go smaller is if the NIT went to 64 teams like the women. There's still a third-tier women's tournament, but it's only the one, and it's only 16 teams.

I have a slightly different idea. As soon as the regular season is over, have the selection committee pick the top 32 teams in the nation. Those 32 teams would automatically advance to the field of 64, and be seeded 1-8, without having to participate in their conference tournaments. The other 315 teams would all be required to play in their conference tournaments. The winners of the 32 conference tournaments would advance to the field of 64, and be seeded 9-16. So the conference tournaments would basically become the early rounds of the NCAA tournament. The conference tournaments would be more competitive because all of the teams that lose would have their season come to an end. So it would be like a single elimination tournament with all 347 teams.
Also, any regular season conference champions that compete in their conference tournament would receive an automatic bye all the way to the conference title game. That would make the regular season more relevant.

(03-11-2016 11:36 AM)andy98 Wrote:  I have a slightly different idea. As soon as the regular season is over, have the selection committee pick the top 32 teams in the nation. Those 32 teams would automatically advance to the field of 64, and be seeded 1-8, without having to participate in their conference tournaments. The other 315 teams would all be required to play in their conference tournaments. The winners of the 32 conference tournaments would advance to the field of 64, and be seeded 9-16. So the conference tournaments would basically become the early rounds of the NCAA tournament. The conference tournaments would be more competitive because all of the teams that lose would have their season come to an end. So it would be like a single elimination tournament with all 347 teams.
Also, any regular season conference champions that compete in their conference tournament would receive an automatic bye all the way to the conference title game. That would make the regular season more relevant.

Can't imagine the conferences signing off on that. Take Duke, North Carolina and Virginia out of the ACC tournament or Kansas, Oklahoma, Baylor and Texas out of the Big 12 tournament, and their crowds take a serious hit. Any conference that loses their best teams, even if just one, would suffer at the turnstile come tournament time. I can't imagine any conference being OK with this.

(03-11-2016 12:13 PM)Cyniclone Wrote:  

(03-11-2016 11:36 AM)andy98 Wrote:  I have a slightly different idea. As soon as the regular season is over, have the selection committee pick the top 32 teams in the nation. Those 32 teams would automatically advance to the field of 64, and be seeded 1-8, without having to participate in their conference tournaments. The other 315 teams would all be required to play in their conference tournaments. The winners of the 32 conference tournaments would advance to the field of 64, and be seeded 9-16. So the conference tournaments would basically become the early rounds of the NCAA tournament. The conference tournaments would be more competitive because all of the teams that lose would have their season come to an end. So it would be like a single elimination tournament with all 347 teams.
Also, any regular season conference champions that compete in their conference tournament would receive an automatic bye all the way to the conference title game. That would make the regular season more relevant.

Can't imagine the conferences signing off on that. Take Duke, North Carolina and Virginia out of the ACC tournament or Kansas, Oklahoma, Baylor and Texas out of the Big 12 tournament, and their crowds take a serious hit. Any conference that loses their best teams, even if just one, would suffer at the turnstile come tournament time. I can't imagine any conference being OK with this.

Was ready to heartily endorse his idea, but you raise a valid point. If the team getting the bye is the RS champ, I'd be for it.

(03-10-2016 12:14 PM)_C2_ Wrote:  

(03-10-2016 11:21 AM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  A 96-team NCAA field is awful. The only reason why it was even considered in the first place was to get more middling power conference teams into the field to make more money for the big boys. It was certainly NOT to provide a way for smaller conferences to double up on regular season and conference tournament champs taking bids. That in and of itself is a deal killer for the powers that be that control college sports.

Regardless, the 68-team field is plenty large enough. I'm fine with the First Four because the number of conferences and Division I teams have expanded over the past 20 years and it was a way to alleviate the increase in auto-bids. The size and pace of the NCAA Tournament as an event is just about perfect - it always boggles my mind how much people think it would be a good idea to mess with it.

No one seeded below 8 has ever won the NCAA Tournament. And that only happened once. Only 3 teams seeded lower than 4 have won the national title. Less than 10 have even made the national title game (maybe as little as 5-7 without doing the research) and about 10 teams seeded 8 or lower overall have made the Final Four.

There's no need to expand a field for teams that don't usually factor into the national title hunt. The last 4 in and last 4 out are usually interchangeable.

9-seed Villanova in 1985.
[EDIT: Villanova was an 8-seed in 1985, not a 9. Thanks to C2 for correcting.]

Not broken, quit fixing it