The tournament needs to be revamped.

[Scooter1]

Guys, every year I watch this tournament, the same thing comes to mind... I am sick and tired of giving Duke, North Carolina, Michigan state, U Conn, and the other top 8 teams in the counrty a pass in the first round. They are getting tune up games for the first round. For these teams, getting into the sweet sixteen is something that they should do every year. They don't play anyone remotely good until maybe the second round or even the third. I say we let the smaller schools at have some kind of chance in the tournament.

I have a way where strength of schedule can still be an important factor but still be fair to the smaller schools who aways seem to draw the 16th or 15th spot regardless as to how talented their team may be.

Here's how to do it. Seed the #1 and #2 spots in each region then make everyone else on equal ground. Throw the names for the teams in each region in a hat and let the chips fall. The #1 and #2 teams should not have a problem with this because due to their overall record and strength of schedule, they are garenteed not to see one of the top 8 schools in the country until the the quarter finals. If they do have a problem with it, it would only be because they don't think they are as good as they want everyone to believe and need that patsy game to start off with. It would certainly make your picks harder and maybe we can stop seeing the stat on how the number 1 and 2 seed are 16 for 16 so far. (they are 16 for 16 because they haven't played anyone yet.)

[WYOBISONMAN]

I think the only way to do it is to have #1 play #16. I think most brackets are set like that.....even ND high school ball, NFL playoffs....etc.

[IndyBison]

How about this idea? Allow every team to participate in the tournament. Set up teams in pre-determined "regionals" with 16 teams in each region. Randomly draw who each team into a bracket within their region and see where it goes from there. Since there aren't an easy multiple of 16 teams in D1, you would end up with some regions with less than 16 teams so some teams would draw a bye in the first round. Some teams would have to play 3 games in a weekend and it would draw the tournament out to 4 weekends.

With this proposal, it's entirely possible that the top 3 or 4 teams in the country could fall into the same region and play each other in the first round. A team that has won very few games could get a bye in the first round. There would be no seeding, just a random draw.

If you are saying to yourself that this is a ridiculous proposal and nobody would ever set up a tournament this way, you are wrong. This is exactly how the Indiana high school basketball tournament is set up! And most people in the state think it is the best system there is. I've given up trying to argue otherwise. It's a carryover from the single class tournament and they've continued it with their multi-class tournament (4 classes).

Football is the same with an added twist. Not only are the match-ups randomly assigned, but so is the location of the game (locations are pre-determined for basketball)!! That means a 9-0 team could travel to play an 0-9 team!! Forget the fact that 0-9 team doesn't even deserve to be in the playoffs.

[bisonmike2]

Here's my solution....change nothing. It's already awesome. I wish more sports were set up like the NCAA b-ball tourney, mainly football. If there is one gripe I have it's that the smaller conferences, like ours, award their bid to the conference tourney winner and not the regular season winner. So the team that proves they are the best team in the conference for 30 or so games could be left behind because they had an off night. If they are going to keep the conference tourney I wish they would do more to protect the #1 seeds. Maybe give them a bye for the first round or perhaps let them host the first 2 rounds. If just doesn't make sense that you could potentially have a 8th placed Summit team as your NCAA representative.

[silkamilkamonico]

Here's my solution....change nothing.

I agree. It's already hard enough to determine the top 34 at large teams without fanbases crying foul when they get left out of the tournament, there would be more people upset at being a #3 team and a random draw, who thought they should have got a #2 seed.

The only chance of giving smaller teams an opportunity is creating a tier system like football, and I think a good majority of mid major teams would be against that.

Bruce Pearl made a good point I thought when he said he would add 3 more "play in games" (6 more at large teams) to play the #1 seeds and the Tuesday games would be part of the tournament as the first round.

Keep in mind the cinderella stories in the NCAA tournament are almost as good for a mid major program as a national championship to the major program. Think of all the great exposure we got from just making it into this tournament.

[bisonmike2]

I agree. It's already hard enough to determine the top 34 at large teams without fanbases crying foul when they get left out of the tournament, there would be more people upset at being a #3 team and a random draw, who thought they should have got a #2 seed.

The only chance of giving smaller teams an opportunity is creating a tier system like football, and I think a good majority of mid major teams would be against that.

Bruce Pearl made a good point I thought when he said he would add 3 more "play in games" (6 more at large teams) to play the #1 seeds and the Tuesday games would be part of the tournament as the first round.

Keep in mind the cinderella stories in the NCAA tournament are almost as good for a mid major program as a national championship to the major program. Think of all the great exposure we got from just making it into this tournament.

That's an interesting idea. I've always wondered why they had the 1 play in game for the last 16 and not for all of them.

[Bison bison]

I say kill the play in game, leave the rest as is.

[bisonaudit]

I think 4 play in games is a good idea but instead of making the 8 lowest seeds play those games (always auto bids from small conferences) make the participants the last 8 at large teams. You'd get a mix of good small conference teams and middle of the pack teams from power conferences.

I'd keep the seeding the same so these 8 teams would likely be playing for the right to play a 6 on Thursday insead of punching a ticket to get pounded by a 1.

This year you would have had something like:
Arizona v. Creighton for the 12 in the Midwest
Maryland v. St. Mary's for the 10 in the West
Minnesota v. Penn State for the 10 in the East
Wisconsin v. San Diego St for the 12 in the East

That line up looks a lot more compelling to me and probably to Dayton, OH (or whoever is going to take the Tuesday game(s) next, and certainly to whoever the TV partner is, than Alabama St. v. Morehead St. 4 times over.

The play-in game(s) count as a tournament unit for distributing $$$ now so something like this would actually stand a chance of approval by the power conferences.

[bisonaudit]

The play in game exists because a 31st conference met the autobid criteria a few years back and the power conferences refused to give up another at-large slot so the solution was to add a 65th team to the field instead.

This year, the last team is was, Arizona and they're still playing.

[Mr. Burgundy]

I would also like to add 9 holes to Augusta National and make it a 5 day tourney. The Wednesday round could be a pro am. (sarcasm). Don't mess with perfection. But, I could care less about the play in game.

[WYOBISONMAN]

The play in game is kinda like masturbation.....it feels kinda like The Dance....but not really......

[bisonmike2]

The play in game is kinda like masturbation.....it feels kinda like The Dance....but not really......

so what your saying is that you like to masturbate while watching men's basketball? :)

/I keed

[56BISON73]

Here's my solution....change nothing. It's already awesome. I wish more sports were set up like the NCAA b-ball tourney, mainly football. If there is one gripe I have it's that the smaller conferences, like ours, award their bid to the conference tourney winner and not the regular season winner. So the team that proves they are the best team in the conference for 30 or so games could be left behind because they had an off night. If they are going to keep the conference tourney I wish they would do more to protect the #1 seeds. Maybe give them a bye for the first round or perhaps let them host the first 2 rounds. If just doesn't make sense that you could potentially have a 8th placed Summit team as your NCAA representative.

My question is why should a regular season conference champion or the tournament conference champion get an auto bid when there might be a better team in another conference that might be more deserving????

[BisonCountry]

Nothing needs to change. Everyone complains Arizona gets in as a #12 and they are in the Sweet 16. People complained that the Horizon got 2 in with Butler and Cleveland St. Butler loses 1st round and Cleveland St. pulls the biggest upset of the tournament. Don't know if we will ever see a 16 beat a 1, but everyone perks up when they see Cal-Northridge or E. Tennessee St. make the #1's earn the victory.

The tournament is setup perfect in my mind as it makes it the great sporting event that it is. It makes the conference tournaments that more exciting too. Maybe there was a more deserving team than the Bison and other mid-major teams, but do you think they would have had a better chance at winning the championship?

[ndsubison1]

dont change a thing... just make sure the best teams get in. simple as that

[Shawn-O]

I agree. It's already hard enough to determine the top 34 at large teams without fanbases crying foul when they get left out of the tournament, there would be more people upset at being a #3 team and a random draw, who thought they should have got a #2 seed.

The only chance of giving smaller teams an opportunity is creating a tier system like football, and I think a good majority of mid major teams would be against that.

Bruce Pearl made a good point I thought when he said he would add 3 more "play in games" (6 more at large teams) to play the #1 seeds and the Tuesday games would be part of the tournament as the first round.

Keep in mind the cinderella stories in the NCAA tournament are almost as good for a mid major program as a national championship to the major program. Think of all the great exposure we got from just making it into this tournament.

The power conferences would gobble up all but maybe 1 of the additional at-larges under Pearl's proposal. Leave it the way it is.

[Hammersmith]

My question is why should a regular season conference champion or the tournament conference champion get an auto bid when there might be a better team in another conference that might be more deserving????

Couple reasons. First, no bubble team has ever won the championship. If you're the 34th or 35th or 36th best team, you're not making it to the finals. But that's not a good enough reason on its own. The deciding factor is opportunity. If you eliminate the autobids, about one third of all DI schools will have ZERO chance of making the tournament. That's roughly 100-150 schools. These are the schools in the low major conferences where the conference strength of schedule is so low that there is no way to put together a tough enough schedule to get an at-large bid, even if the full field of 65 are at-larges.

Look at us. We came reasonably close to sweeping the conference schedule, played a decent non-conference schedule(around 100 out of 340), and we still would have been on the outside looking in. And we are in one of the best of the low-major conferences. On average(Pomeroy/Sagarin/RPI), there are 9-10 conferences below us in which even a very good team could not make the tourney even if they swept their conference and played a demanding non-conference schedule.

Look at it this way, if you keep it the way it is, you are denying around 10-20 worthwhile schools the chance to make the tourney. But those 10-20 are made up of different schools every year, and the ones that missed the cut will always have a chance the following year. If you go to a complete at-large format, you will still have 5-10 schools that arguably should have gotten in, but you would also have over 100 schools that had zero chance this year, zero chance next year, zero chance the year after that, and so on. That kind of segregation would rip Division I apart.

At least with the way it is now, every school except for the independents and the reclassifiers have a real chance to make the tourney. Also, why is a fourth or fifth place finisher in a power conference more deserving than a conference champion from a low major? Didn't the former have plenty of chances to show what they could do against top competition and still came up lacking?

Now, if someone wants to argue that the regular season champion deserves the autobid rather than the conference tourney champion, well, that's a whole 'nother kettle of fish. But, as I posted a few days back, the conference tourney winner receiving the autobid is a decision made by each individual conference and it all has to do with money.

[Hammersmith]

The power conferences would gobble up all but maybe 1 of the additional at-larges under Pearl's proposal. Leave it the way it is.

I'm not sure if this was part of Pearl's proposal or if it came from someone else, but I liked the idea of 4 play-in games with the autobids excluded from those games. It would mean that every conference champion would be guaranteed a 15-seed or better and that many of the at-larges from the high-major conferences would knock each other out in the play-in game or as the play-in winner versus the 1-seed. Who knows, this might actually be the way a 16 finally knocks off a 1. In any case, bumping up all the autobids a minimum of 8 spots/2 seeds (or 5 spots/1.25 seeds depending how you look at it) would give many conference champions a much better chance of pulling off a first round win.

[bisonaudit]

I'm not sure if this was part of Pearl's proposal or if it came from someone else, but I liked the idea of 4 play-in games with the autobids excluded from those games. It would mean that every conference champion would be guaranteed a 15-seed or better and that many of the at-larges from the high-major conferences would knock each other out in the play-in game or as the play-in winner versus the 1-seed. Who knows, this might actually be the way a 16 finally knocks off a 1. In any case, bumping up all the autobids a minimum of 8 spots/2 seeds (or 5 spots/1.25 seeds depending how you look at it) would give many conference champions a much better chance of pulling off a first round win.

I'm not sure that the power conferences (and lets face it, they're the ones making the decisions) would be to jazzed to have the UConn's, Pitts's, North Carolina's, and Louisville's of the world playing the Arizona's, Minnesota's, Wisconsin's or Maryland's on day 1.

[Hammersmith]

I'm not sure that the power conferences (and lets face it, they're the ones making the decisions) would be to jazzed to have the UConn's, Pitts's, North Carolina's, and Louisville's of the world playing the Arizona's, Minnesota's, Wisconsin's or Maryland's on day 1.

Curses! You spotted the fatal flaw in my brilliant plan. (Well, not really my plan. Actually, it wasn't my plan at all.) You might try to convince them that the extra revenue sharing money they'd get would make it worth it, but I don't think it would fly either. Frankly, the Dance has so much inertia built up that I don't think anything could change it. Not even the addition of the play-in game was really a change; it was actually added to maintain the status quo(34 at-large bids).

[NorthernBison]

An idea I heard floated was to forget about the tuesday game between the 64th and 65th teams (they both stay in for Thursday or Friday as 16 seeds). Instead, add another three teams to the tournament field. This brings it to 68 teams. The three added teams are the last three bubble teams that didn't quite make the field (increases at-large pool to 37 teams). Then play four games on Tuesday by matching up the last 8 at-large teams. Those teams would play for the 12 seeds in each region as that typically is where the last at-larges get seeded.

One thing it would do is make Tuesday a pretty interesting day with four evenly matched teams playing off to see who is in.

[silkamilkamonico]

The power conferences would gobble up all but maybe 1 of the additional at-larges under Pearl's proposal. Leave it the way it is.

Until the mid major's that get in the tournament via at-large bid actually start winning a game or so in the tournament, I don't see why the NCAA should feel compelled to seriously consider them for at-larges when they are being compared to teams with resumes like Arizona and Wisconsin.

The only conference aside from the 6 powers to do well as at-large bids is the Atlantic-10. Even the vaunted Mountain West hasn't had a team win a game in the tournament via at-large in 5 years.

[Shawn-O]

An idea I heard floated was to forget about the tuesday game between the 64th and 65th teams (they both stay in for Thursday or Friday as 16 seeds). Instead, add another three teams to the tournament field. This brings it to 68 teams. The three added teams are the last three bubble teams that didn't quite make the field (increases at-large pool to 37 teams). Then play four games on Tuesday by matching up the last 8 at-large teams. Those teams would play for the 12 seeds in each region as that typically is where the last at-larges get seeded.

One thing it would do is make Tuesday a pretty interesting day with four evenly matched teams playing off to see who is in.

If they feel the need to expand the field at some point, that's probably the best idea I've heard.

[90 BISON]

If the field is expanded to 68, it would hurt Mid-Majors. Especially teams like NDSU. We wanted to get a 13 seed this year before the tourney. If 3 more teams were added to the field, face it there would be Mid-Major champions playing for the right to have a 16 seed. This would not bode well for us, (although likely St. Mary's and Creighton would both have likely made it in) because we would drop three more spots in the brackets.