Hi everyone, thought I would post an idea I've had for a few years for autobids to the NCAA Tourney that I think will give the regular season and conference tournaments sime more relevance as well as give the mid-major conferences some more exposure and TV executives a few more games to air. I also think this allows for mid-major conferences the opportunity to send their best representative into the NCAA Tournament to earn units, but also allow for another representative to compete in the NIT.

To receive an autobid to the NCAA Tourney, it would be a requirement to be at least a regular season co-champion and win your conference tournament. If a conference produces a different winners, their regular champ and tourney champ would play in a play-in game for the NCAA autobid while the loser would earn an autobid to the NIT (provided they don't earn an at-large bid to the NCAA Tourney). If there are multiple regular season champs, the team who earned the 1st seed in their conference tournament would play the conference tournament winner. Conferences wouldn't be required to play if the regular season champion representative is safely in as an at-large, in which case, the conference tournament winner would receive the autobid. That way we wouldn't have multi-bid leagues playing a meaningless game and still allow for bid stealing. On average from 2014-2021 (excluding 2020), there would have been an average of 10 play-in games each season. There would have been as few as 6 games and as many as 14 games based on this data range. I would let conferences decide who would host their play-in game, which likely would be either their regular season champ representative or the host of their conference tournament.

To get creative selection Sunday weekend, I would require all conference tournaments to conclude on the Saturday before selection Sunday and likely allow for multi-bid leagues to host their championship games throughout the day on Saturday and then on Selection Sunday, all the play-in games be played during an 8 hour window leading up to the bracket reveal (which I would push to 7 PM), and thus giving the mid-majors a day for exposure leading up to the NCAA Tournament. I would also look to stagger conference tourney championship games and play-in games to give the weekend an early march madness appetizer before the main course arrives.

Of course a drawback is TV executives on Friday wouldn't want a bunch of semifinals competing against each other during the evening or forced into the daytime window and I'm sure some major conferences wouldn't want to lose their Sunday window for championship games. There is also the chance a player who plays in the play-in game to get injured although I would think when players will be able to get paid here soon for NIL, that might make it worth the 1 extra game. One last thing is that I think this might result in tournament expansions, which may be good or bad depending on your opinion. I think I would cap the NCAA Tourney at 72 teams and consider NIT expansion to 40-48 teams.

Sorry this is long, hope you enjoy it.

Welcome aboard! I’m going to offer a tweak to your plan, that makes things less complicated:

What if all the mid majors (everyone but the top 6-7 conferences) gave their regular season champion a bye all the way to the conference final?

It gives your best team the best shot to represent in the tournament while still participating the conference tournament.

If it's me I would want the at large bids under more scrutiny then the auto bids. I'm fine with a team making a run for a auto bid. For at large bids I want a winning conference records as the bare minimum for at large bids. If a team goes 10-10 in conference then there only hope should be the conference tournament. This is the easiest way to move the bids from the big 10 7-9 to the void conferences. Your looking at probably 6 teams at year removed from the at large bids.

(04-11-2021 09:04 PM)46566 Wrote:  If it's me I would want the at large bids under more scrutiny then the auto bids. I'm fine with a team making a run for a auto bid. For at large bids I want a winning conference records as the bare minimum for at large bids. If a team goes 10-10 in conference then there only hope should be the conference tournament. This is the easiest way to move the bids from the big 10 7-9 to the void conferences. Your looking at probably 6 teams at year removed from the at large bids.

I AGREE

(04-11-2021 08:27 PM)Fighting Muskie Wrote:  Welcome aboard! I’m going to offer a tweak to your plan, that makes things less complicated:

What if all the mid majors (everyone but the top 6-7 conferences) gave their regular season champion a bye all the way to the conference final?

It gives your best team the best shot to represent in the tournament while still participating the conference tournament.

I think that’s much more realistic.

It’s instructive that everyone in the NCAA already has the power to award their auto-bid to their regular season champs, but none of them choose to do so. The TV money that leagues receive for that “win and in” conference title game is simply too great compared to the alternative. What’s most “fair” in determining a champion isn’t necessarily what’s most compelling for TV... which is evidenced by the single elimination nature of the NCAA Tournament itself.

So, I think it’s more of matter of giving the regular season conference champ a greater advantage (a bye to the championship game as you’ve suggested or at least to the semifinals) instead of attempting to supplant the conference tournament auto-bid (which won’t happen).

I love the OP idea! My one hesitation with Muskie's wrinkle is the rust factor.

(04-11-2021 09:58 PM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  

(04-11-2021 08:27 PM)Fighting Muskie Wrote:  Welcome aboard! I’m going to offer a tweak to your plan, that makes things less complicated:

What if all the mid majors (everyone but the top 6-7 conferences) gave their regular season champion a bye all the way to the conference final?

It gives your best team the best shot to represent in the tournament while still participating the conference tournament.

I think that’s much more realistic.

It’s instructive that everyone in the NCAA already has the power to award their auto-bid to their regular season champs, but none of them choose to do so. The TV money that leagues receive for that “win and in” conference title game is simply too great compared to the alternative. What’s most “fair” in determining a champion isn’t necessarily what’s most compelling for TV... which is evidenced by the single elimination nature of the NCAA Tournament itself.

So, I think it’s more of matter of giving the regular season conference champ a greater advantage (a bye to the championship game as you’ve suggested or at least to the semifinals) instead of attempting to supplant the conference tournament auto-bid (which won’t happen).

Though the MAC has gone the other way. They had the top four schools with a first round bye, going straight into the quarterfinals, with the remaining eight playing in, hosted at the higher seeded school. When the tournament was reformed, rather than giving a semi-final bye to the top two or a championship bye to the top team, they went to a top eight tournament and the bottom four DNQ.

And as far as I can tell, that is with the support of the basketball schools. I think one concern is that too many byes sees a team that was higher ranked in the regular season come into their first tournament game a little "cold" compared to their opponent.

It also makes the quarterfinal seeding a more predictable reward for regular season performance ... since if a #5 v #12 play-in game sees a fluke result, perhaps due to untimely injuries or (in this season) non-start by key players in the #5 team, the #4 could end up seeded against #12, while the #2 team is seeded against #7.

Or, conversely, if there are three schools whose seasons are basically washed out, #12 might be determined to try to go out with a bang while #10 has checked out for next year, and #5 came into the quarterfinals after a tough scrap while #7 hosted a nice easy warm up scrimmage to get ready for the quarterfinals.

Of course, the fact that there was no visible media value to the four first round games surely made dropping the first round entirely an easier decision.

(04-11-2021 08:27 PM)Fighting Muskie Wrote:  Welcome aboard! I’m going to offer a tweak to your plan, that makes things less complicated:

What if all the mid majors (everyone but the top 6-7 conferences) gave their regular season champion a bye all the way to the conference final?

It gives your best team the best shot to represent in the tournament while still participating the conference tournament.

Good suggestion with a different approach for the mid majors’ conference tournaments. I think that’s similar to what the WCC implemented.

The Ivy League method also makes sense. Limit the conference tournament to the most successful regular season teams.

(04-11-2021 09:04 PM)46566 Wrote:  If it's me I would want the at large bids under more scrutiny then the auto bids. I'm fine with a team making a run for a auto bid. For at large bids I want a winning conference records as the bare minimum for at large bids. If a team goes 10-10 in conference then there only hope should be the conference tournament. This is the easiest way to move the bids from the big 10 7-9 to the void conferences. Your looking at probably 6 teams at year removed from the at large bids.

This will never happen for the same reason autobids will never be limited to regular season champs. The reason is that at least 97% of the NCAA tournament TV audience is casual fans, and only the 3% or less who are diehards care about these things. The 97%, not the 3%, are the reason CBS and Turner think it's worth paying $1 billion/year to televise March Madness.

Why isn't anything done to prevent the possibility of a low-major team going 1-17 in the conference regular season, then getting lucky 3 games in a row and winning the autobid in a conference tournament? Because the 97% Do. Not. Care. whether the America East autobid goes to the team that finished 1st or the team that finished 10th. Either way it's just another team the 97% don't know anything about getting a chance to upset a power conference team in the first round.

Why isn't anything done to prevent the committee from selecting a power conference team that only won half its conference games? Because the 97% want to see the big names that they recognize (and that drive the TV ratings) in the tournament, and they Do. Not. Care. whether Duke, Kentucky, UCLA, Kansas, etc. was 18-0 or 8-10 in conference games. The 97% never look at conference regular season standings and couldn't possibly care less about them.

(04-11-2021 11:51 PM)Erictelevision Wrote:  I love the OP idea! My one hesitation with Muskie's wrinkle is the rust factor.

Well, the team that would possibly be harmed is the regular season champ, but I don't think any regular season champ wouldn't accept this deal. Much better to get a bye to the final than have to play other games you could lose.

IOW's, "rust" is a problem that team would be glad to have to deal with, IMO.

(04-12-2021 09:34 AM)Wahoowa84 Wrote:  

(04-11-2021 08:27 PM)Fighting Muskie Wrote:  Welcome aboard! I’m going to offer a tweak to your plan, that makes things less complicated:

What if all the mid majors (everyone but the top 6-7 conferences) gave their regular season champion a bye all the way to the conference final?

It gives your best team the best shot to represent in the tournament while still participating the conference tournament.

Good suggestion with a different approach for the mid majors’ conference tournaments. I think that’s similar to what the WCC implemented.

The Ivy League method also makes sense. Limit the conference tournament to the most successful regular season teams.

The new MAC format is the top eight rather than the top four, but if some clever fellow thought to call it the "Ivy League method" that couldn't have hurt getting it supported in such a strongly Presidents driven conference as the MAC.

(04-12-2021 10:39 AM)Wedge Wrote:  

(04-11-2021 09:04 PM)46566 Wrote:  If it's me I would want the at large bids under more scrutiny then the auto bids. I'm fine with a team making a run for a auto bid. For at large bids I want a winning conference records as the bare minimum for at large bids. If a team goes 10-10 in conference then there only hope should be the conference tournament. This is the easiest way to move the bids from the big 10 7-9 to the void conferences. Your looking at probably 6 teams at year removed from the at large bids.

This will never happen for the same reason autobids will never be limited to regular season champs. The reason is that at least 97% of the NCAA tournament TV audience is casual fans, and only the 3% or less who are diehards care about these things. The 97%, not the 3%, are the reason CBS and Turner think it's worth paying $1 billion/year to televise March Madness.

Why isn't anything done to prevent the possibility of a low-major team going 1-17 in the conference regular season, then getting lucky 3 games in a row and winning the autobid in a conference tournament? Because the 97% Do. Not. Care. whether the America East autobid goes to the team that finished 1st or the team that finished 10th. Either way it's just another team the 97% don't know anything about getting a chance to upset a power conference team in the first round.

Why isn't anything done to prevent the committee from selecting a power conference team that only won half its conference games? Because the 97% want to see the big names that they recognize (and that drive the TV ratings) in the tournament, and they Do. Not. Care. whether Duke, Kentucky, UCLA, Kansas, etc. was 18-0 or 8-10 in conference games. The 97% never look at conference regular season standings and couldn't possibly care less about them.

I'd argue the casual can wouldn't care who is playing in the tournament. As you stated in your case most don't look at conference standings but they looked at the total W-L record.. you're going to add a team from conferences ranked 6-10. Out of your 97% claim if sure there is going to be a good chunk who just watch the NCAA tournament or watch a few games a year with whatever is on ESPN.

While brand recognition is a good thing I doubt it would matter with teams under the 10 seed. While all of the bottom seeds are all the 22 lower conferences. At most your giving a smaller conference how much would it change a year 5-7 spots? Maybe 10 tops? That's basically the play in games for last 4 weeks in plus 11-12 seeds. At beast they get a 10 seed or 9.

(04-12-2021 11:11 PM)46566 Wrote:  

(04-12-2021 10:39 AM)Wedge Wrote:  

(04-11-2021 09:04 PM)46566 Wrote:  If it's me I would want the at large bids under more scrutiny then the auto bids. I'm fine with a team making a run for a auto bid. For at large bids I want a winning conference records as the bare minimum for at large bids. If a team goes 10-10 in conference then there only hope should be the conference tournament. This is the easiest way to move the bids from the big 10 7-9 to the void conferences. Your looking at probably 6 teams at year removed from the at large bids.

This will never happen for the same reason autobids will never be limited to regular season champs. The reason is that at least 97% of the NCAA tournament TV audience is casual fans, and only the 3% or less who are diehards care about these things. The 97%, not the 3%, are the reason CBS and Turner think it's worth paying $1 billion/year to televise March Madness.

Why isn't anything done to prevent the possibility of a low-major team going 1-17 in the conference regular season, then getting lucky 3 games in a row and winning the autobid in a conference tournament? Because the 97% Do. Not. Care. whether the America East autobid goes to the team that finished 1st or the team that finished 10th. Either way it's just another team the 97% don't know anything about getting a chance to upset a power conference team in the first round.

Why isn't anything done to prevent the committee from selecting a power conference team that only won half its conference games? Because the 97% want to see the big names that they recognize (and that drive the TV ratings) in the tournament, and they Do. Not. Care. whether Duke, Kentucky, UCLA, Kansas, etc. was 18-0 or 8-10 in conference games. The 97% never look at conference regular season standings and couldn't possibly care less about them.

I'd argue the casual can wouldn't care who is playing in the tournament. As you stated in your case most don't look at conference standings but they looked at the total W-L record

That is not what I said. I said the 97% don't look at conference record. I did not say they look at overall record. They don't, unless everyone in the media makes a big deal out of a team being undefeated or 29-1. Anything below that, and the casual fan is more likely to watch a "brand name" they recognize like North Carolina or Kansas without having any idea whether UNC or KU is 28-6 or 18-16. They absolutely don't scrutinize overall records and think, "Hmmm, East Dakota Tech won 4 more games than North Carolina, so I'll watch East Dakota Tech instead."

(04-11-2021 09:04 PM)46566 Wrote:  If it's me I would want the at large bids under more scrutiny then the auto bids. I'm fine with a team making a run for a auto bid. For at large bids I want a winning conference records as the bare minimum for at large bids. If a team goes 10-10 in conference then there only hope should be the conference tournament. This is the easiest way to move the bids from the big 10 7-9 to the void conferences. Your looking at probably 6 teams at year removed from the at large bids.

This seems like a reasonable compromise to me.

(04-12-2021 11:30 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(04-12-2021 11:11 PM)46566 Wrote:  

(04-12-2021 10:39 AM)Wedge Wrote:  

(04-11-2021 09:04 PM)46566 Wrote:  If it's me I would want the at large bids under more scrutiny then the auto bids. I'm fine with a team making a run for a auto bid. For at large bids I want a winning conference records as the bare minimum for at large bids. If a team goes 10-10 in conference then there only hope should be the conference tournament. This is the easiest way to move the bids from the big 10 7-9 to the void conferences. Your looking at probably 6 teams at year removed from the at large bids.

This will never happen for the same reason autobids will never be limited to regular season champs. The reason is that at least 97% of the NCAA tournament TV audience is casual fans, and only the 3% or less who are diehards care about these things. The 97%, not the 3%, are the reason CBS and Turner think it's worth paying $1 billion/year to televise March Madness.

Why isn't anything done to prevent the possibility of a low-major team going 1-17 in the conference regular season, then getting lucky 3 games in a row and winning the autobid in a conference tournament? Because the 97% Do. Not. Care. whether the America East autobid goes to the team that finished 1st or the team that finished 10th. Either way it's just another team the 97% don't know anything about getting a chance to upset a power conference team in the first round.

Why isn't anything done to prevent the committee from selecting a power conference team that only won half its conference games? Because the 97% want to see the big names that they recognize (and that drive the TV ratings) in the tournament, and they Do. Not. Care. whether Duke, Kentucky, UCLA, Kansas, etc. was 18-0 or 8-10 in conference games. The 97% never look at conference regular season standings and couldn't possibly care less about them.

I'd argue the casual can wouldn't care who is playing in the tournament. As you stated in your case most don't look at conference standings but they looked at the total W-L record

That is not what I said. I said the 97% don't look at conference record. I did not say they look at overall record. They don't, unless everyone in the media makes a big deal out of a team being undefeated or 29-1. Anything below that, and the casual fan is more likely to watch a "brand name" they recognize like North Carolina or Kansas without having any idea whether UNC or KU is 28-6 or 18-16. They absolutely don't scrutinize overall records and think, "Hmmm, East Dakota Tech won 4 more games than North Carolina, so I'll watch East Dakota Tech instead."

My wife and elder daughter (both are casual sports fans who graduated from Duke), were shocked to learn that Duke and Kentucky didn’t make the tournament. We also informed them that UNC and KU were not dominant this year. They labeled this a ‘fake’ tournament...did badly in their brackets and had little interest in the games.

Casual fans are just more engaged when blue bloods are doing well.

(04-13-2021 09:08 AM)Gamecock Wrote:  

(04-11-2021 09:04 PM)46566 Wrote:  If it's me I would want the at large bids under more scrutiny then the auto bids. I'm fine with a team making a run for a auto bid. For at large bids I want a winning conference records as the bare minimum for at large bids. If a team goes 10-10 in conference then there only hope should be the conference tournament. This is the easiest way to move the bids from the big 10 7-9 to the void conferences. Your looking at probably 6 teams at year removed from the at large bids.

This seems like a reasonable compromise to me.

The only problem there is that it implicitly presupposes (1) that each conference is playing the same number of league games; and (2) it ignores relative conference strength. The WCC only plays 16 conference games because Gonzaga was flirting with the MWC. I don't think there is any reason to assume that a 10-6 BYU team should get an at large bid out of the WCC but a 10-10 ACC, SEC, or B1G team that has a robust RPI and good out-of-conference victories should be forced to win the conference tournament just to get into the tournament.

(04-13-2021 10:22 AM)CarlSmithCenter Wrote:  

(04-13-2021 09:08 AM)Gamecock Wrote:  

(04-11-2021 09:04 PM)46566 Wrote:  If it's me I would want the at large bids under more scrutiny then the auto bids. I'm fine with a team making a run for a auto bid. For at large bids I want a winning conference records as the bare minimum for at large bids. If a team goes 10-10 in conference then there only hope should be the conference tournament. This is the easiest way to move the bids from the big 10 7-9 to the void conferences. Your looking at probably 6 teams at year removed from the at large bids.

This seems like a reasonable compromise to me.

The only problem there is that it implicitly presupposes (1) that each conference is playing the same number of league games; and (2) it ignores relative conference strength. The WCC only plays 16 conference games because Gonzaga was flirting with the MWC. I don't think there is any reason to assume that a 10-6 BYU team should get an at large bid out of the WCC but a 10-10 ACC, SEC, or B1G team that has a robust RPI and good out-of-conference victories should be forced to win the conference tournament just to get into the tournament.

Of course that 10-6 record for BYU means you have lost to teams that are not named Gonzaga or St. Mary's. You tend to have your RPI killed with bad losses in a conference with a huge drop-off after the top 3.

(04-13-2021 10:22 AM)CarlSmithCenter Wrote:  

(04-13-2021 09:08 AM)Gamecock Wrote:  

(04-11-2021 09:04 PM)46566 Wrote:  If it's me I would want the at large bids under more scrutiny then the auto bids. I'm fine with a team making a run for a auto bid. For at large bids I want a winning conference records as the bare minimum for at large bids. If a team goes 10-10 in conference then there only hope should be the conference tournament. This is the easiest way to move the bids from the big 10 7-9 to the void conferences. Your looking at probably 6 teams at year removed from the at large bids.

This seems like a reasonable compromise to me.

The only problem there is that it implicitly presupposes (1) that each conference is playing the same number of league games; and (2) it ignores relative conference strength. The WCC only plays 16 conference games because Gonzaga was flirting with the MWC. I don't think there is any reason to assume that a 10-6 BYU team should get an at large bid out of the WCC but a 10-10 ACC, SEC, or B1G team that has a robust RPI and good out-of-conference victories should be forced to win the conference tournament just to get into the tournament.

I get the arguments, but I just don't think a 9-9 SEC or other P6 team deserves a bid. Surely there is another team out there that is above .500 (possibly even within the same conference) that is worthy and can fill the spot