THE NEW REPUBLIC

28.03.2008

A More Perfect Tournament: Aaron Kaplowitz

Of course March Madness is great. "The best spectacle in sport." "Three weeks without equal." Blah blah blah. Not content to leave well enough alone, we want to know if it can be better. We're in search of a more perfect tournament. So, we asked a few friends of the magazine if they had any ideas for improving the NCAAs. Here's what Aaron Kaplowitz, a reporter for SLAM, thinks we should do.

The talking heads at ESPN have been talking their heads off about expanding the number of participants in the NCAA Tournament's field--a blasphemous proposal to college basketball purists who believe that the NCAA has found perfection in 64. (Or is it 65?) I know just the solution to quench the desires of those who wish to see more teams--and a more exciting March--without disrupting the current system.

The NCAA should keep Selection Sunday as is, but delay the start of the tournament by a week. Cram the 32-team National Invitation Tournament into that extra week, with the winner receiving the final ticket to the Big Dance.

Since purchasing the NIT in 2005, the NCAA would look to make more money with another week of unpredictably wild basketball, while restoring glory and relevance to a tournament that used to be The Tournament. And the bubble schools that were the first teams out of the Field of 64 would get the opportunity to prove their worth. I bet the much maligned NCAA Selection Committee wouldn't mind the load off.

--Aaron Kaplowitz

Posted: Friday, March 28, 2008 8:14 PM with 3 comment(s)

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The Plank said:

Of course March Madness is great. "The best spectacle in sport." "Three weeks without

March 28, 2008 8:30 PM

Crock1701 said:

Here's the problem with more teams: The people who lobby most incessantly for this aren't the fans, they're the coaches. Every Coach knows a few years out of the tourney, at home in March, can they get fired. Of course though, expanding the field means adding in more mad big conference teams. I haven't really missed Virginia Tech, or Arizona State, or Florida or Ohio State. They weren't going anywhere, and they'd have already gone home. We already have a crazy week to get the last spot in the tournament: It's called Conference Tournament weekend: UGA and Illinois both had deep runs that, in one case, turned teams from afterthoughts to tournament teams. All of these ideas (see Leitch's expand it to everyone) are people who don't actually look at College Basketball before March 10. Conference tournaments, the way they're set up, actually do just that, they just also don't make it easy. If you want to appease bubbles, add 2 play in games for the last 4 at large teams (stop exiling at least one team that EARNED its spot to Tuesday night in Dayton, OH with nobody watching). Almost every year on the Monday after the brackets are announced, the whole media pretty much IDs one team that people think were shafted (This year Arizona State, last year Syracuse). Have them play the last Big Conference At Large in, and satisfy everyone.

March 28, 2008 10:09 PM

tsbuttry said:

While the ideas to improve the tournament have all been entertaining and many quite funny, I think the biggest and best idea has been overlooked: A tournament with no commercials.

Just make everyone buy the tourney on Pay-Per-View or with a DirecTV-like package, keep the teams' 30-second timeouts and a shorter halftime, but trash the 30 minutes worth of timeouts that CBS crams down our throat each tournament game (the 4 "official" timeouts each half and extending the first "30 second" timeout taken by each team in a half). Making people pay for it will ensure that the NCAA and television still make their money, but I think even more people would watch the games if we didn't have to sit through about 100,000 commercials each game.

March 29, 2008 11:45 AM