Yes, I know this post-season tournament has a prestigious history (older than the NCAA, I think), and perhaps 30-40 years ago had some cache (mainly because the NCAA tournament field was too small), but I think it’s time to put this fight for 66th place to sleep. Evidence:
Michigan’s senior captain Lester Abram, on the honor of having his team selected to the 2007 NIT field: “It’s not like we’re going to go out there and lose on purpose – whatever happens, happens. You’re happy you’re still playing, but nobody wants to play in the NIT. It’s something you have to do, though.”
Injured Kansas State forward Billy Walker spent his time on the bench during last night’s tournament loss to DePaul munching on some popcorn.
Since N.C. state famously refused to accept an NIT invitation in 1984 (the year after they won the NCAA), 5 teams have declined invitations, including Maryland in 2006 (coach Gary Williams publically refused, until he learned that the home-court Comcast center was already committed as an NIT site. Williams then accepted the invitation, but his team was eliminated in the first round by Manhattan college).
As of 2006, the tournament has eliminated the requirement that invitees have at least a .500 record (though as of yet, no sub-.500 team has been selected).
Last night’s Syracuse-San Diego St. game drew over 26,000 fans in a deliberate effort to break the old attendance mark (set in 1979) of 23,000. That’s all OK, but none of the other games played last night drew more than 8000 fans, and the average attendance in 2005 was ~7500 for pre-finals and ~12,000 for the finals–in spacious Madison Square Garden.
Turning to TV, the NCAA final typically averages 17 million homes, while the NIT is lucky to get 1 million. CBS paid $6.2 billion in 2002 for 11-year rights to the NCAA tournament; ESPN paid $24.1 million for a ten-year deal in 2000. Even C. M. Newton concedes “We’d love to have great crowds, but that is not a financial consideration.”
If the players don’t care, the fans stay away, and “financial considerations” are all that’s keeping this tournament afloat, why not just expand the NCAA field to 96 teams and be done with it?
I was just thinking about this when I heard that the committee is considering expanding the field to add 3 more play-in games (one per region) - which would add 3 more teams. Slight hijack: My personal feeling on this matter is that this move will marginalize the smaller conferences (a la Niagara and Florida A&M - both, as conference champions, in my opinion should have automatically been in the field - with non-champions in the play-in game. I worry that the selection committee will put most of the smaller champions in play-in games, thus clearing the way for the big boys who don’t have to play an additional game). /hijack
BUT the point I was trying to make before I got distracted - is that IF they expand the March Madness field with 3 more teams, it’s just going to further the decline of the NIT.
If I was the NIT, I’d scrap the post-season tournament in favor of hyping the pre-season NIT, which I think is legitimately coming into its own. The whole “kick off the season with a monster event” works for Nascar. Should work for the NIT.
Did you know that the NCAA bought the NIT for $50 million a few years ago?
So every penny the NIT makes goes back to the NCAA. If they get $24 million a year in TV rights, that’s a pretty good return on investment. And of course the schools get both a cut of that and whatever extra money they can make by playing an extra home game or two. How much income in tickets and concessions did those 26,000+ make for Syracuse?
So it comes down to money, money, and money.
The real question is: how can Syracuse legitimately complain about being left out of the NCAA tournament if they would up only a number 2 seed in NIT? Explain that, Jim Boeheim.
Not to hijack (again) - but this gets me every year… (And this is not clearly directed at you Exapno - you just triggered it).
Irritated about being left out of the NCAA Tournament? Let me ask you something… Did. You. Win. Your. Conference?
If so, then yes, you legitimately have a gripe.
If not, then sorry - I don’t care who you beat, what your record is, how many fans you have, or anything. You didn’t take care of business. You left it up to luck - and that’s why you’re not in the tourney. Stop complaining. Thank your lucky stars that there IS an NIT and you’re not sitting on campus twiddling your thumbs.
I know this is a cliche` but N.I.T. = Nobody’s Interested Tournament.
Actually, that’s not entirely true. There are probably a number of people with serious gambling problems who see the NIT as a way to offset whatever losses they suffer from their NCAA picks.
Like Trunk, I’ve never bet on the NIT. The reason I haven’t was touched on by CJJ* in the OP - some of the players don’t care. They feel slighted to be in the NIT or they feel disappointed or whatever.
Who wants to put money down when you don’t know if players are even going to give it their all? Same reason you won’t catch me betting on boxing.
There is a preseason NIT, and I think the main tournament is large enough - expand to 128 and there is no longer any competition over who gets in and who doesn’t.
The NCAA tournament has had any number of sub-.500 teams qualify by winning their conferences.
I admit there’s not much reason to have a postseason NIT, but if some fans are interested and maybe it can boost the stature of overlooked programs, there’s not much reason to cancel it either.
Um, right. That’s what we were talking about up there. That they should focus on the preseason NIT since it’s really starting to generate interest. Or was your point… well, I dunno. What was your point? That the preseason NIT was enough - and they should drop out of the post-season?
More importantly - how could we sneak out of work to see 64 freaking games?! It’s hard enough slipping out to watch 32. If only I worked at Best Buy.
Actually - the problem I have with 128 is that it makes the conference tourneys irrelevant. Of course the conference tourneys made the regular-season somewhat irrelevant, so I guess shit happens. I imagine we would adapt if the NCAA expanded the tournament to 128 teams. But I think it would dilute the brand somewhat.
I think it is like asking why are there so many college bowl games? The NIT gets played at a time where there are few other sporting events occurring. MLB hasn’t started the regular season and you’re still a month away from NBA and NHL playoffs.
If there wasn’t ESPN coverage, I doubt it would have survived this long.
I’ve heard the idea of adding three play-in games advanced this year by both Bruce Webber (who’s Illini got in the big dance) and Steve Alford (whose Hawkeyes didn’t). It’s a good idea, but IMO these coaches’ comments are somewhat self-serving, as I’ll bet they assume the play-in game should be for the 16th seed in each region–where the Florida A&M’s and Niagara’s lurk–and not harm their chances of playing in the round of 64.
Good compromise: Make the 12th seed in each region an at-large play-in game; that’s about the level where the last at-large teams are seeded anyway. It doesn’t have to work exactly like that, but if they add play-in games, it should be the at-larges rather than the conference chanpions who play in them (FYI: the play-in game was added IIRC because a small conference split in two, thus requiring an additional automatic bid. The larger conferences complained that this was effectively reducing the number of lower-seeded at-large bids, which are usually taken by midling teams in large conferences. So the NCAA added the extra game.).
I was respoding to gonzomax’s comment that they should move the NIT to the preseason. Maybe he means that they should have a 32-team preseason tournament, but I don’t know if that’s practical.
He’s saying that if you don’t win your conference, you leave your fate in the hands of the selection committee and have no right to complain.
My point exactly. That’s why they have a legitimate gripe.
I agree with you 100%. It frustrates me to no end for a team to get an automatic qualification to the Tournament and then get stuck in the play-in game.
ETA: Sorry I missed you on preview Marley23:
Cool, Marley23, thanks for the explanation. I’m not sure about the practicality either, but I will say that I really enjoyed the pre-season NIT this year. I just think they could do a better job hyping it.
They probably could. I forget how many teams are in the preseason NIT, but I’m a big March Madness fan. The NCAA might be concerned about drawing big teams away from events like the Great Alaska Shootout, which might be important in terms of regional exposure.
I don’t think the number 90 team would reach the Final Four very often. As it is, a 15 seed rarely beats a 2 and 16 has never beaten a #1 - if there were 128 teams, a #1 would play #33. This would probably add more non-competitive games without doing much to improve the tournament.
There are currently 16 invitees to the NIT Tip-off. The NCAA has rules limiting the total number of games a team can play in their regular season (I think it’s 29). Pre-season tournaments sanctioned by the NCAA have an “exempt” status, meaning that no matter how many games you play in them (knocked out in 1st round or play four games to win it all), it all counts as one game toward your season total. If you’re in a conference with a post-season tournament, that also counts as only one game, no matter how many you actually end up playing in it.
The problem was, the NCAA has had a rule limiting teams to appearances in only 2 exempt pre-season tournaments every four-year period. This essentially meant that teams can participate in the pre-season NIT at most only once every other year; otherwise all games you play in a tournament count toward your limit of 29. That depletes the number of available “draw” teams (Duke, Kentucky, UCLA) too much for a pre-season tournament to expand much beyond 8 teams. The NCAA revised this rule in the sprting of 2006 so now a school can play in one exempt tournament a year. But still, I’m not sure this is enough to cause the pre-season NIT to expand beyond 16; another factor is, if the tourney is much larger, and you lose in the first round, you’re next game may be 2+ weeks later.