NCAA Tournament Expansion

[Fastbreak]

Friday, May 19, 2006
Complaints from ACC basketball not logical

By Lenox Rawlings
JOURNAL COLUMNIST

ACC expansion hurt ACC basketball, and NCAA rejection hurt the ACC basketball ego. Only four of the 12 teams made the 2006 NCAA field, attracting some ACC apologists to Coach Jim Boeheim's campaign for expanding the tournament. During spring meetings at the Ritz-Carlton on Florida's Amelia Island, Commissioner John Swofford endorsed enlarging the draw beyond the current 65 teams.

Few spectacles can match the absurdity of wealthy folks on expense accounts at an island resort joining a protest march.

Question: "Where do you dump the courtesy Mercedes before you pick up the sign on the stick?"

Answer: "Valet parking, you imbecile."

In the latest installment of "Welfare for Millionaires," ACC coaches and bureaucrats deride the selection committee's disrespect. Their essential argument: ACC teams deserve more recognition for the pressures endured and performances required in America's toughest conference.

That sounds fine, but last season the rhetoric far exceeded the product. No ACC team reached a regional final, only the second time that had occurred since 1979. North Carolina and N.C. State survived one round. Duke and Boston College survived two. The SEC qualified two teams for the Final Four, champion Florida and semifinal loser LSU.

The Collegiate Basketball News, which produces a computerized ratings percentage index of teams and leagues, ranked the ACC fourth behind the SEC, Big Ten and Big East.

The NCAA selection committee's final computer rankings had Duke No. 1, Carolina 14, Boston College 17, N.C. State 51, Maryland 60, FSU 70, Miami 72, Clemson 79, Virginia 80, Wake Forest 89, Virginia Tech 148 and Georgia Tech 162 (trailing Georgia, Georgia Southern, George Washington, George Mason, Georgetown, Tennessee Tech, Louisiana Tech, Texas Tech and Virginia Tech).

FSU played a dog of a schedule

ACC lobbyists offered two candidates for the bubble, which burst abruptly during the ACC Tournament. FSU, which had beaten Duke at home and lost its four other games against ranked teams, finished the ACC season 9-7. The Seminoles melted against last-place Wake Forest in the first round, checked out 78-66 and presented a 19-9 record to the selectors.

That should have been the end of the story. For the umpteenth year, FSU refused to recognize the committee's insistence on a solid nonconference schedule. Other than losing to Florida in an unavoidable rivalry game, FSU took a pass. The Seminoles played just one nonconference game outside the state, beating Bowling Green in Alabama, and mostly played dregs, which left their outside schedule on the dog side of No. 300.

The argument that a winning ACC record should guarantee a spot worked in the past, but expansion mangled the schedule and diluted ACC schedule strength. FSU played Duke twice but had just one game each against Carolina, BC and N.C. State. America's toughest conference should generate more than four games against ranked teams.

Maryland (19-12, 8-8 at the decision hour) beat BC in December but went 0-7 in other games against ranked teams, won only two road games (Georgia Tech, Virginia) and shot 35 percent while fading 80-66 against BC in the ACC quarterfinals.

The Terps demonstrated their mettle in the NIT, which Coach Gary Williams planned to skip until Athletics Director Debbie Yow overruled him. In the swift end, Williams missed only a couple of tee times. Maryland tapped out in its first game, against Manhattan.

FSU fared slightly better, beating Butler before dropping a home overtime game to South Carolina 69-68. The Gamecocks (23-15) won the NIT for the second straight year and jumped from No. 62 to No. 36 in the NCAA's computer rankings.

The committee picks 34 at-large teams, which means that teams ranked No. 60 (Maryland) and No. 70 (FSU) would need massive expansion to deserve inclusion. Maybe the ACC should stop whining and deal with facts, including the silent backlash against a bully league luring three schools from the Big East and causing residual upheaval.

Maybe Leonard Hamilton, the FSU coach, should soften his questioning of NCAA reps and strengthen his schedule.

Maybe the ACC should spend less time grandstanding and more time putting some passion in the grandstands for the painfully emotionless first day of the expanded ACC Tournament. In the old ACC, people skipped work to see the quarterfinals. Now it takes an entire day to qualify teams for the quarterfinals, and many ticket-holders skip basketball in favor of work.

Maybe the NCAA should stop waffling and eliminate the ridiculous play-in game between Team No. 64 and Team No. 65. If the NCAA subtracted one more at-large entry, Air Force would have to stay home. Big deal.

The real-world view of expansion: CBS holds the cards. CBS covers 90 percent of the NCAA's budget for all sports through the basketball contract worth $6 billion over 11 years, or $545 million per.

CBS will decide if and when it wants expansion, and the NCAA will slap the rubber stamp on that document after several committee meetings at island resorts and a big national convention - all expenses paid, all the time.

• Lenox Rawlings can be reached at [e-mail]

www.journalnow.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=WSJ%2FMGArticle%2FWSJ_ColumnistArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1137836182283&path=%21sports&s=1037645509200

[wsu97]

fastbreak said:

CBS will decide if and when it wants expansion, and the NCAA will slap the rubber stamp on that document after several committee meetings at island resorts and a big national convention - all expenses paid, all the time.

That about sums up everything wrong with college basketball today.

[Big D From UIC]

wsu97 said:

fastbreak said:

CBS will decide if and when it wants expansion, and the NCAA will slap the rubber stamp on that document after several committee meetings at island resorts and a big national convention - all expenses paid, all the time.

That about sums up everything wrong with college basketball today.

Although it is probably inevitable, because it's all about money, expansion is only wanted to help the big teams and hurt the small teams. All the sudden, because some mid-majors are taking more spots, it's time to increase the field to 80, or whatever? Well, when we have 80, who's going to push for 90, and then 100?....we may as well just have every team in the postseason

[wsu97]

Don't mess with the success of 65
Posted: May 30, 2006


If I were running the meeting, it would go something like this:

Last item on the agenda: Consideration of expanding the NCAA Tournament field.

Motion: Let's not and say we did. Can I get a second? All in favor? The ayes have it. Can we go hit Del Frisco's for dinner?


When the NCAA men's basketball committee convenes in Orlando later this month, that's how it should handle the suggestion from some coaches to increase the size of the tournament field from 65 teams.

Given that the field hasn't expanded, for all practical purposes, in more than two decades, incoming committee chair Gary Walters, the athletic director at Princeton, figures a study isn't unreasonable. "There's no action that's imminent on this," he says. "You have to look at it with a certain amount of care."

Coaches argue that increased parity in Division I means more tournament-quality teams and, therefore, more tournament-quality teams are being excluded. There is evidence in support of that contention:

1) George Mason reached the 2006 Final Four.

2) You mean we should have more than one reason?

If there is parity in college basketball now, it's because there always has been parity. There has been no apparent increase, even as the higher levels have been hit hard by early NBA draft entry. Here's my case:

1) Teams from the top six conferences are getting roughly the same number of high seeds as they did 20 years ago. Teams from those leagues filled 17 of the 20 highest seeds in the 2006 tournament. They filled 16 of the top 20 spots in 1986.

2) Teams from the top six conferences are experiencing the same level of tournament success. In 2006, they filled 11 spots in the Sweet 16 -- the same number they filled in 1996 and 1986. They also filled three of the Final Four spots in each of those seasons.

3) Teams from the top six conferences have an even greater share of top players. In 2006, they produced 10 of the 12 guys on the consensus All-American first and second teams. That's up from eight of 11 in 1986.

In this sport, parity is a word used by those who have no access to the NCAA records book.

So if the landscape is not changing, there had better be some other justification for altering the tournament. From the standpoint of aesthetics and popularity, it's in phenomenal shape. The 65-team format is a significant reason for the event's audience growth, which led to a huge contract between CBS and the NCAA that helped fuel and subsidize the recent escalation of coaching salaries.

The selection process has become college basketball's version of the NFL draft -- an event built around computer charts and conference tables that nevertheless fascinates the game's most ardent fans. The two-day opening round has become such an event Forbes magazine reports that work time lost because of employees following games is worth about $3.8 billion to American businesses.

Diluting the NCAA Tournament field could have a much greater cost.

Senior writer Mike DeCourcy covers college basketball for Sporting News. E-mail him at [e-mail].

www.sportingnews.com/yourturn/viewtopic.php?t=96331

[Retired Coach]

65 To 80? NCAA Tournament may expand
By Stu Durando
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
05/31/2006

Many NCAA basketball power brokers would like to see a bigger Big Dance, and the idea will be discussed at the end of June.
(Gerry Broome/AP)

Barry Hinson's pain was not the incentive that prompted college basketball's hierarchy to discuss expansion of the NCAA Tournament.

The push for growth has been led by the game's power brokers, such as Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim, and has received boisterous support from the almighty Atlantic Coast Conference.

Yet, there is probably not a more passionate supporter than the Missouri State coach, whose 2005-06 team became one of the most qualified based on Ratings Percentage Index not to be selected for what is now a field of 65 participants.

"If we are the largest revenue-generating sport that pays a majority of all the NCAA's bills, then why in the world would we not try to expand?" Hinson asked. "Don't give me the saying, 'If it's not broke, don't fix it.' Let's not be complacent with what we have. Let's find a way to get better."

Missouri State was No. 21 in the RPI on Selection Sunday but was bypassed for an at-large berth, giving the Bears the best RPI of any team not to play in the NCAA Tournament.

The men's basketball tournament committee is expected to address expansion when it meets June 26-30 in Orlando, Fla. And the idea is being supported by coaches at every level and of every degree of success.

A specific proposal has not been discussed. Talk has ranged from the addition of play-in games for each region to a jump to 80 teams.

"We had that discussion at the Big Ten meetings, and everyone was unanimous that it needs to be done," Illinois coach Bruce Weber said. "We've continued to expand the number of teams, and the gap is getting smaller between the bigs and littles. ... It would be helpful if they would open it up.

"You're talking about coaching livelihoods. So much is done for the student-athletes, and we need to stick up for ourselves. This is one way we could save a guy's career."

Some coaches point to the growing college football bowl lineup to support their argument. Last season, 56 of 119 Division I-A football teams played in a bowl game, and the number of postseason events seems to keep growing. Meanwhile, the number of Division I basketball teams has grown to 334.

"I think the more you put in the better," St. Louis University coach Brad Soderberg said. "But on the other hand, where does it end? Where does the controversy end? When everyone is in?"

Soderberg has concocted his own system, which involves a complete overhaul of the tournament. Under his proposal, every regular-season conference champion would qualify automatically. He would eliminate conference postseason tournaments in favor of "district" tournaments based on geography, with the winners of each district filling out the field.

Meanwhile, more modest changes are being considered. A group of coaches recently met with the committee, and chairman Gary Walters later told reporters, "We're going to have a serious discussion, and then we'll make some decision about where we'll proceed from there."

The tournament added one team in 2001 when a play-in game was squeezed into the mix. The last large-scale addition came in 1985, when the field increased from 53 to 64.

If expansion is approved, it would not be implemented until at least 2008.

Doug Elgin, commissioner of the St. Louis-based Missouri Valley Conference, pointed out that myriad logistical problems would be created by expansion. He is curious how the seeding of teams would change and when the additional games would be played.

And there's the issue of distribution of tournament funds, which is now set at $164,000 per unit. More teams would probably mean less money per team.

"Right now I would favor it because in most years the Missouri Valley has one or more teams that don't get in that are absolutely deserving," he said. "The most important thing is having access to the championship."

As usual, many teams left out of the field in March complained they were more deserving than others. Maryland, Florida State and Cincinnati were among them.

The selection of several mid-major programs in 2006 and their subsequent success has raised concern within major conferences.

"Everyone is alarmed," Weber said. "The success of the mid-majors backed the committee's decisions. Now if they have a choice between a mid-major or high-level team, it's probably going to be the mid-major that gets in. So it's not a surprise that the big guys are clamoring."

[e-mail]
314-340-8232

www.stltoday.com/stltoday/sports/stories.nsf/othersports/story/91324C80F43CB0EC8625717F00220719?OpenDocument

[Retired Coach]

Pump up the tournament?

By Jeff Rabjohns
[e-mail]

It's time to expand the NCAA Tournament. Sixty-five teams aren't enough.

So says Jim Boeheim of Syracuse. And Billy Donovan of Florida. And Paul Hewitt of Georgia Tech. Heck, Oliver Purnell of Clemson wants to double the field.
Amid such opinions -- often loudly expressed -- from such high-profile coaches, the NCAA Division I men's basketball committee plans to discuss expanding the event at its meeting June 25-30. It's doubtful any change is imminent, and one would need to pass through a series of legislation. But there appears to be growing support for a move to 68 teams within five years, and bumping the field to 80 in the future isn't out of the question.
Here are some common arguments for and against expansion:
PRO: It would increase interest and money.

The tournament has expanded nine times since starting in 1939 with eight teams. Public interest has increased along the way, thanks in no small part to Cinderella upsets. CBS currently is paying $6 billion over 11 years because of strong viewership from the first round through the Final Four.
Increasing the field would mean more possible Cinderellas, and more moneymaking games overall. A 65-team field means 64 games; an 80-team field likely would mean 79. CBS would pay more to cover the event, which would mean more money distributed to schools. Everybody wins.
CON: Everybody wins but fans.

Fans may love upsets, but the fact is major ones are rare. A No. 16 seed has never beaten a No. 1. How would an 18th or 20th seed fare against Duke?
"More opportunity to be involved in a great sporting event sounds like a positive, but you have to weigh that against, 'What would that do to a great sporting event?' " said Butler coach Todd Lickliter, who has been to the Sweet Sixteen and had a 25-win team left out of the tournament.
PRO: D-I has grown; so should the tournament.

There were 282 colleges competing in Division I in 1985 when the tournament expanded to 64 teams. That's 22.7 percent of teams making the NCAA field. Now there are 326 D-I teams. Having 65 teams in the tournament is just 19.9 percent. The field would need to be bumped to 74 schools to get back to that 1985 ratio.
CON: Really, most every team is in it now.

Every D-I conference but the Ivy League has a postseason tournament whose winner gets an NCAA bid. Therefore, as ESPN commentator Dick Vitale said, all those teams are essentially in the tournament already. "If they have a poor season, they have that one last dream and opportunity to pull out a miracle and get in the NCAAs," Vitale said.
PRO: Too many big-conference schools are left out.

This seems to be the main argument from those pushing hardest for expansion.
It's obvious mid-major schools have improved relative to bigger counterparts, a product of the latter increasingly losing underclassmen to the NBA. But fuzzy feelings aside, how many mid-major powers are really better than midlevel big-conference schools? Last year only four ACC schools made the tournament; does anyone really believe only four ACC teams were among the nation's 65 best? And shouldn't that be what it's all about?
Keep the Cinderellas. But make room for more deserving teams.
CON: Don't cry for the bigs.

Mid-majors aren't window dressing. This past season, George Mason reached the Final Four, Bradley and Wichita State the Sweet Sixteen.
Plus, it's laughable to pity the big schools, who have so many advantages. For one, they often "buy" as many as 10 games per year, paying inferior foes to come to their building for an easy win. Last season, Syracuse didn't leave New York until Jan. 11. The mid-majors don't have the money for that, and often have to travel to play better competition. Bottom line: If teams can't win in their own conferences, they don't belong in the tournament.
PRO: A bigger field would ease unfair expectations.

None other than John Wooden thinks all 326 teams should be invited to the tournament, for one reason because it has become so big, so all-or-nothing status-wise, that there is too much pressure on coaches to get there. Many a coach has won a lot of games but been fired because athletic directors (and fan bases) wanted to reach the tournament more often.
CON: Coaches' high salaries demand pressure.

This is just big-school coaches protecting themselves. Florida's Billy Donovan once lamented that, "If it's about intercollegiate athletics and it's not just a money-making situation, then we need to find a way to let everyone in." But consider this money-making situation: Donovan's $1.7 million annual compensation is nearly 23 times that of the average UF professor. Shouldn't he be expected to win?

www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060603/SPORTS/606030498/1004

[Retired Coach]

Mason's run widened rift between majors, middlings
June 8, 2006
By Gregg Doyel
CBS SportsLine.com Senior Writer

George Mason didn't heal college basketball, at least not from the inside. The Patriots' run from the NCAA Tournament bubble to the Final Four excited fans and attracted television viewers, but it had a different effect on the game's foundation.

It scared the biggest schools. And it galvanized the small ones.

Two months later, coaches around the country tell CBS SportsLine.com, the rift between majors and mid-majors is bigger than ever. Which is saying something.

As a group, college basketball's biggest schools have only embraced the smaller schools as sparring partners, someone to be bloodied in the pursuit of national championships. Because of that, the majors and the mid-majors have never gotten along. Never have, never will. There's too much pride and money -- mostly money -- at stake.

But now it's getting contentious.

"We've created a lot of interest in that topic," George Mason coach Jim Larranaga said.

You can see it in the sudden move -- triggered by the biggest schools -- to expand the NCAA Tournament from 65 teams to a number closer to 80. It's no coincidence that in the same season the Big East grew to an unrealistic 16 teams and the NCAA Tournament invited more mid-majors than ever, Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim began lobbying for expansion.

The rest of the Big East and the game's biggest conferences have had Boeheim's back, saying at various league meetings this spring that college basketball has outgrown the tournament's 65-team field.

"Everyone is alarmed," Illinois coach Bruce Weber told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. "The success of the mid-majors backed the committee's decisions. Now if they have a choice between a mid-major or high-level team, it's probably going to be the mid-major that gets in. So it's not a surprise that the big guys are clamoring."

The biggest mid-majors support expansion, too, but not with the zeal of the majors; leagues like the Missouri Valley and Colonial are starting to break through for multiple bids, with or without expansion. George Mason made it to the Final Four. Wichita State and Bradley reached the Sweet 16. UW-Milwaukee and Montana reached the second round.

The smaller leagues -- the bottom third of college basketball -- aren't happy about expansion at all. They know expansion would mean more bids for the ACC's sixth-best team or the Big Ten's No. 7 finisher, not more bids for the Southern Conference or Ohio Valley runner-up.

Additionally, expansion would mean another layer of play-in games. Which teams would get stuck in that already unpopular event? The lowest seeds, from leagues like the Northeast and Mid-Continent. For those leagues, tournament expansion ultimately would mean tournament shrinkage. Hello, Dayton. Goodbye, actual NCAA Tournament.

But the rift goes deeper than the makeup of NCAA Tournament.

As the biggest leagues have done for years, colluding to control the game and ultimately its $6 billion NCAA Tournament contract (through CBS), the mid-majors are finally beginning to think and act as a group.

Already two mid-major leagues -- the MAC and the Ohio Valley -- have decided not to sell themselves to the highest bidder for "guarantee games," which for years have tilted the balance of power toward the biggest leagues. Guarantee games are essentially bought victories, and the money (and victories) only flow in one direction.

For example, a big school from the SEC pays a small school from the SWAC a fee in the neighborhood of $40,000 -- the guarantee -- to play one game on the SEC team's court. According to research by his staff, Larranaga says the home team won roughly 95 percent of the guarantee games played during the 2004-05 season.

With a 5 percent win rate and the crushing impact that has on a conference's RPI, why would smaller schools continue to serve themselves up on a platter to the majors that are trying to take their spot in the NCAA Tournament?

"If ACC teams play six guarantee games each, that's 72 games and they're likely to go something like 68-4," said Larranaga, who favors NCAA Tournament expansion. "It means that league is going to have a tremendous RPI."

For leagues like the SWAC and America East, whose basketball programs arguably couldn't survive unless they sold losses to the highest bidder, guarantee games are a necessary evil.

But for the bigger mid-majors -- now that the NCAA Tournament selection committee has begun to award multiple bids to their leagues -- guarantee games have become more of a hindrance than a help. Which is why league officials from the Missouri Valley, Colonial and Horizon are considering following the lead of the MAC and OVC, and urging their memberships to quit selling itself to win-hungry and money-bloated majors.

Smaller schools also are bristling under the leadership of the National Association of Basketball Coaches, the profession's governing body that is closer to the U.S. Senate than the House of Representatives -- an elite and misrepresentative group, in other words.

The NABC represents more than 1,000 schools at all levels of basketball, with less than 10 percent of those schools in the major Division I category. However, the NABC's Board of Directors counts 13 of its 21 members (62 percent) from major schools. One of the NABC's purposes, according to its website, is "to unify coaches on issues pertaining to basketball at all levels."

Making better choices as NABC president -- the programs of several past NABC leaders, including Kelvin Sampson, Eddie Sutton, Denny Crum and Mike Jarvis, have been found guilty of recruiting violations -- would help.

There is much to unify. The NABC had better get started. Giving more of a voice to smaller schools -- or stifling the majors, whatever -- would be a good place to start.

www.sportsline.com/collegebasketball/story/9487118

[Raiderfan]

I have been waiting for the mid majors to finally stand up to the big boys (BCS schools) and say, "NO were are no longer going to be your whipping boys and ONLY PLAY GAMES AT YOUR PLACE"

Wait until the BCS schools are forced to actually go out on the road to play.......their resumes won't look so attractive to the NCAA selection committee any more.

[Raider Country]

Coaches want tournament doubled, but would settle for less
June 25, 2006
CBS SportsLine.com wire reports

INDIANAPOLIS -- In a perfect world, college basketball coaches would nearly double the size of the 65-team NCAA Tournament field. Realistically, they would accept a smaller victory.

Motivated in part by George Mason's remarkable Final Four run last season, coaches will urge the NCAA to expand its most lucrative championship event during the men's and women's basketball committee meetings in Orlando, Fla., this week.

"They'd love to see the tournament double to 128," said Jim Haney, executive director of the National Association of Basketball Coaches. "It's based on several things. First, there are a lot of good teams worthy of making the NCAA field, and second, the size of 64 or 65 has been in place for a number of years."

Potential models range from minor adjustments to major changes.

When Haney met with NCAA officials last month, he proposed the 128-team field in part because postseason bids might help coaches keep their jobs.

At this year's Final Four, though, Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim said he supported expansion on a smaller scale. Boeheim and others suggested adding three to seven teams, a move they claimed would allow as many as four opening-round games to be played in Dayton, Ohio, instead of the one now played between the two lowest-seeded teams in the field.

Some believe such a schedule would create a more realistic tournament environment since first-round sites also play four games on the first day.

But changes don't appear imminent.

In March, NCAA president Myles Brand said he didn't see much support to expand the field and vice president for men's basketball Greg Shaheen reiterated that point Friday.

"Many, many people believe the size of the championship is just right," Shaheen said. "A lot of people think there's enough recognition of teams that did well and there's a logical and timely conclusion to the season."

Shaheen said this week's discussions, which end Thursday, will mark the first time expansion has been on the agenda in several years. The reason?

After a four-year legal battle with the National Invitation Tournament, the NCAA agreed to buy the tournament for $56.5 million last August.

Expansion also faces additional hurdles.

If the NCAA opted for a 128-team field, the number of first-round sites would double and an extra week of play would likely be added. Plus, Shaheen said the NCAA would have to debate how best to provide maximum television coverage.

Shaheen said changes would also have to be made in conjunction with the women's tournament.

"There is no one model that is obvious here, and that's something we need to contemplate," he said. "The other issue is how the women's tournament would be similarly impacted here and they need to coincide."

The coaches, however, contend there are many reasons to expand. Among their arguments:

The number of Division I teams has increased significantly since the last major expansion more than two decades ago. The field went from 48 to 64 teams in 1985, then added a 65th team to the field in 2001 when the number of automatic bids went from 30 to 31.

George Mason, which was one of the last at-large teams to make the field this year, proved parity in college basketball is real. The combination of prominent programs losing underclassmen at faster rates and scholarship reductions have helped mid-major schools become more competitive. The coaches believe they deserved to be rewarded accordingly.
Now that the NCAA controls both postseason tournaments, coaches think it's time to include some of the bubble teams that annually complain when they are left out.

Could it happen?

"I don't think the idea of doubling the field is going to happen right now because there are too many complications to do that," Haney said. "But I think the committee will seriously consider what the number will be. ... I think if it happens, it will have to happen soon because of the logistical issues."

AP NEWS
The Associated Press News Service

www.sportsline.com/collegebasketball/story/9525770

[Class of '83]

Any expansion of the NCAA tournament will come at the expense of the NIT. Suddenly the NIT becomes worthless and less of a draw for fans. This is the main reason I think NCAA finally bought the rights to the NIT, so they can bury it and expand the NCAA's.

[Fastbreak]

The NIT has been worthless for decades. It is about time it is put to rest anyways.

[Class of '83]

Updated: June 29, 2006, 6:21 PM ET
NCAA Tournament field to remain at 65 for now
By Andy Katz
ESPN.com


The NCAA Tournament will remain at 65 teams for the foreseeable future after the men's basketball committee decided against any kind of expansion at its annual spring meetings this week in Orlando.

The NCAA announced the decision Thursdsay.

The National Association of Basketball Coaches had been pushing to expand the tournament beyond the 65 with a number to be determined. The NABC saw the access to the tournament as one of the reasons to expand, especially in light of the run by mid-majors of late and a few bubble teams not making the field that some coaches were convinced should have been included.

"There is no enthusiasm on the part of the committee to expand the tournament at this time," said men's committee chairman Craig Littlepage, the athletic director at Virginia. "In the interest of sustaining the quality of the tournament, the committee has decided to maintain the current structure."

He said the 10-member committee examined the quality of competition, the logistics in adding more teams, television ratings and the overall popularity of the tournament. It was the first time in several years that possible expansion was discussed, he said.

The women's committee came to a similar conclusion, said chairwoman Joni Comstock, the athletic director at American University.

There also are contractual issues that make expansion a non-issue for years to come. Creating more rounds would alter the postseason dates that would run into other programming on CBS, the network of the championship.

Ultimately, the NCAA views conference tournaments as a way for all teams to have access to the NCAA Tournament. Teams that win conference tournaments (everyone has one now except for the Ivy) get into the field.

Andy Katz is a senior writer at ESPN.com. Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=2504515

[Willie]

It would have ruined March madness if they expanded to 128.

[Bomber]

Tourney expansion: An idea whose time hasn't come
By Pat Forde
ESPN.com

In what might be the dumbest idea since "Rocky VI," a movement has emerged to double the size of the NCAA Tournament to 128 teams.

The movement was spearheaded by the National Association of Basketball Coaches. I'm not here to cast aspersions at NABC brainstorms, but this is the same group that once passed a resolution requesting that its members be referred to, officially and publicly, as "teacher-coach." Just the term I associate with Dave Bliss, Jim Harrick and Jerry Tarkanian.

Anyway, I'm sure the NABC would love to get 326 bids and admit everyone. But somebody has to play in the NIT, right?

The plan, however, isn't going anywhere, at least not soon. The NCAA men's basketball committee decided against any kind of expansion at its annual spring meetings this week in Orlando.

The 128-team thinking hinged on the fact that more bids means more happy administrators and alums, which means more coaches keep their jobs, which was the abiding motivation of the NABC. (Motto: Nobody Does Shameless Self Interest Quite Like Us. Now Quit Asking Us About Graduation Rates.)

If you want to know how galvanizing the 128-team tournament might have been, scan the final pre-tournament RPI from the 2005-06 season. When you reach triple digits, cue the CBS tournament theme music in your head and feel your pulse pound as you envision the Drexel Dragons taking the floor in the first round.

That's 15-16 Drexel, the No. 128 team in America.

Just what March Madness needs, right? Can you imagine the electricity produced by having the Dragons, Northern Illinois (17-11, No. 127), Massachusetts (13-15, No. 126) and Siena (15-13, No. 125) as our No. 32 seeds?

The mind reels at the thought of the No. 31 seeds. Hardwood royalty, all of them.

Since Drexel conceivably could have benefited from the proposed expansion last March, I called its coach, Bruiser Flint. Asked him a simple question: Did you have an NCAA Tournament team last season?

"No, no," Flint said, after he managed to stop laughing. "We definitely weren't good enough to be in the NCAA Tournament. I'm not fooling myself."

But what if the NABC wants to fool the public? What if they want to turn the Big Dance into Woodstock and let the likes of last year's Drexel team into the tournament?

"I can understand why they might say it and want it, but I like it the way it is," Flint said, immediately becoming my favorite coach for a day. "With the NIT the way it is now [40 teams], you're putting 100 teams in the postseason. That's about one-third of Division I.

Sixty-four teams gives the NCAA Tournament everything. (Sixty-five, the actual current number in the field, adds an inconvenient Tuesday game in Dayton and one more bid for a middling at-large team -- but it's only a minor annoyance.) The 64-team tournament is athletic art, as close to perfect as any sporting competition can get.

Memo to college basketball: Mess with perfection at your own peril. There is such a thing as too much of a good thing, and this would be it.

College basketball has its own little masterpiece going. The best sporting event in the world. Three weeks of variety, unpredictability, drama and excitement.

Why junk it up with all that clutter?

Da Vinci resisted the temptation to paint a fez on the Mona Lisa. The Egyptians did not sell advertising on the sides of the pyramids. There is no juice bar in the Acropolis.

There is no need for more NCAA Tournament games.

This is the George Mason Legacy at work. Schools everywhere see a mid-major that barely got in the tournament make a fairy tale Final Four run and want that same chance.

It's understandable. It's also unlikely to be duplicated anytime soon.

Better to use Mason as inspiration to work harder, not inspiration to ask for a free handout. That's how Flint, whose team played against Mason in the Colonial Athletic Association, views it.

"The year before, George Mason was 15-14 [actually 16-13] and came in fifth place [actually sixth] in our conference," Flint said. "They returned everyone from that year and were a perfect mid-major team.

"We only lost one player from last year, so we're kind of in that same boat. I see a little bit of it in how we worked out in the spring. That gives us hope. It gives everyone hope that it might happen for them."

Or you could change the rules of engagement, asking for a virtual free pass to the tournament.

In aiming for the absurd (128 teams), the NABC actually was willing to accept much less. It would have taken 68, which would create four play-in games among de facto No. 16 and 17 seeds. It would have taken 80. It would have taken 96.

It should take 65 and like it. Among the many reasons:

• Academic advisers have long held that March Madness has a bad habit of ruining grades, as teams spend extended periods of time away from the classroom at conference tournaments and then the NCAAs. So I'd like to hear the teacher-coaches explain how a fourth week of NCAA Tournament play and travel is going to help players maintain academic progress toward their degrees.

• Do you want to be the guy who draws up the bracket for this thing? Plans the sites, does the seeding, arranges the team hotels, the practice schedules, the interview schedules? It's a mammoth undertaking as it is. Doubling it for the sake of Siena and UMass is silly.

• A regular season that already is dwarfed by March would be further diminished. Billy Donovan could play his second string the entire month of February and Florida still would be assured a place in the tournament.

There already is enough sketchy basketball being played in the first round of the tourney. Who among us wants to pay NCAA tournament ticket prices to see a 16-17 first-round game? Which sponsors want to buy airtime for those games?

Building up an artificial achievement and then selling it as something legitimate is no way to save coaches' jobs. The college football equivalent is the 6-6 team going to a bad bowl game in a bad city. Everyone sees through that ruse.

(FYI: For those convinced that the zeal to make the NCAA Tournament has caused schools to lose their priorities and put too much pressure on coaches, check out Northern Arizona, No. 117 in your RPI program. The Lumberjacks won the Big Sky Conference regular-season championship this past season but lost in the league tournament and missed the Big Dance for a sixth straight season. Yet coach Mike Adras received a three-year contract extension this month.)

"You put 128 in," Flint said, "and it's like playoff hockey."

Check the ratings to see how America responded to that this year.

Despite the innumerable reasons why it should never happen, the coaches have asked the NCAA to examine tournament expansion. Northern Illinois coach Rob Judson, a likeable guy whose team could have been on the field-of-128 bubble, represented the Mid-American Conference on the NABC committee that passed the proposal.

"For the non-BCS leagues, I think expansion would be very exciting and beneficial," Judson said.

I asked Judson the same question I asked Flint: Was your team an NCAA Tournament team?

"Ohhhh," Judson said, hemming for a minute, then hawing. "We were close. … We were not one of 64. With expansion, now we can make a good case."

"I don't know that you'd find a coach that wouldn't be supportive of it."

Mr. Judson, meet Mr. Flint. My new favorite college basketball coach.

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