CSNbbs

I've argued that the Alston ruling, should it favor the athletes, will lead to colleges pursuing new revenue streams.

If the kids are getting paid and there's no longer an amateurism guise. At that point, I don't see a reason for the collective college universe to refrain from seeking out any and all means of revenue generation.

The NCAA is mostly toast anyway at that point, but I'd like to see everyone's thoughts on how exactly this ruling might affect college basketball specifically because there's a heck of a lot of money on the table that could be acquired easily if the moneymakers pull out of the NCAA Tournament structure.

I tend to think the P5 will lead the way along with a handful of powerful basketball-only conferences. At that point, I could see a delineation similar to the FBS/FCS split. Both sub-divisions can have their own tournament.

I would suggest these leagues be included in the upper tier which would entail certain privileges with regard to administration and revenue:

Power 5 = ACC, Big 12, Big Ten, PAC 12, SEC

Group of 5 = AAC, CUSA, MAC, MWC, Sun Belt

Basketball Only = Big East, Atlantic 10, WCC, MVC


The advantages are many...

1. Cut out the NCAA middle man

2. Reduce the number of mouths to be fed so that the tournament maintains what makes it special without the gratuitous inclusion of every team that has made its way into D1.

3. Creates an opportunity to alter the basketball regular season to maximize the number of feature match-ups.

4. Gives the most powerful leagues another bargaining chip with networks.


After the cut has been made then we could get down to re-structuring the actual tournament.

- Cut the number of teams back down to 64.

-Give an auto-bid to each conference's regular season winner as well as their tournament winner.

-The rest of the bids should be determined by a committee, but games played against teams in the lower sub-division should be treated like FCS games. You can play them, but you can't play very many and have them count towards your resume.

Those are some excellent ideas for increasing basketball revenue.

One more that might be worth considering: shift the schedule just enough so that basketball season doesn't overlap with football season. Alabama is typical: the Tide played 7 games during the month of November, and the season ends on March 9th. What if the whole schedule was shifted forward one month - would that be so bad? And Tide basketball wouldn't be competing with football for a solid month...

(01-14-2019 07:27 AM)Hokie Mark Wrote: [ -> ]Those are some excellent ideas for increasing basketball revenue.

One more that might be worth considering: shift the schedule just enough so that basketball season doesn't overlap with football season. Alabama is typical: the Tide played 7 games during the month of November, and the season ends on March 9th. What if the whole schedule was shifted forward one month - would that be so bad? And Tide basketball wouldn't be competing with football for a solid month...

I think we should do that regardless.

Outside of may 1 or 2 non conference matchups, its a ghost town at SC games in November and December.

Those 14 conferences would have these numbers of members:

Power -
ACC: 14/15 (with Notre Dame, non-football)
B1G: 14
SEC: 14
PAC: 12
XII: 10

Group -
AAC: 12/14 (presuming Army joins Navy, football-only)
CUSA: 14
MWC: 12
MAC: 12
SBC: 10/12 (with UALR & UTA, non-football)

Non-Football -
BE: 10
A-10: 14
WCC: 10
MVC: 10

Total basketball programs: 173
A 64-school tournament would be 37% of the schools. That seems like a good percentage. Now, there are 354 basketball programs with 68 making the tournament which is 19%. It would essentially double the participant percentage.

(01-14-2019 03:29 PM)BePcr07 Wrote: [ -> ]Those 14 conferences would have these numbers of members:

Power -
ACC: 14/15 (with Notre Dame, non-football)
B1G: 14
SEC: 14
PAC: 12
XII: 10

Group -
AAC: 12/14 (presuming Army joins Navy, football-only)
CUSA: 14
MWC: 12
MAC: 12
SBC: 10/12 (with UALR & UTA, non-football)

Non-Football -
BE: 10
A-10: 14
WCC: 10
MVC: 10

Total basketball programs: 173
A 64-school tournament would be 37% of the schools. That seems like a good percentage. Now, there are 354 basketball programs with 68 making the tournament which is 19%. It would essentially double the participant percentage.

I could be wrong here, but I think if you look outside those conferences then you're not going to find very many tourney wins.

Now obviously, not all those leagues are equal in quality or value, but they bring nice fan bases to the table. One of the main reasons the NCAA Tournament is popular is because every corner of the country is represented. My plan though should give more bids to the lower tier leagues and create a similar degree of interest across the country.

That and including several conferences maintains the spirit of the tournament which is everyone wants to see an underdog have a nice run right up until a traditional power wins it all. That's pretty much what people tune in for.