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Since the topic first came up a year or two ago, I've been vehemently opposed to any argument for expanding the NCAA tournament. There have been proposals for doubling the size of the field, making it 96 (Rick Pitino's idea), or adding three more play-in games ... every one of them irritated the hell out of me. Whey mess with something so perfect?My arguments against expansion weren't particularly altruistic ... I like the number 64 (or 65, I suppose, if I'm forced to acknowledge the play-in game) because it splits perfectly into a balanced tournament of 4 16-team regions, which happens to fit snugly, but nicely, on an 8½ x 11 sheet of paper. I'm sorry, but I like that. It's just all very neat and linear. It makes sense.
But I might be changing my mind. College basketball (if you don't count the NIT, and let's not, since it's very much a consolation prize) has the lowest percentage of teams that qualify for the postseason of all the major North American sports, and hockey.
College Basketball: 19.3%. 65 out of 336 teams.
MLB: 26.6%. 8 out of 30 teams make the playoffs.
NFL: 12 out of 32 teams make the playoffs: 37.5%
College Football: 62 teams play in bowl games, out of 119 total: 52.1%
NBA: 16 out of 30 teams make the playoffs: 53.4%
NHL: 16 out of 30 teams make the playofs: 53.4%
I know that there are problems with making these comparisons, and different sports are under different circumstances (particularly college football, where it's a very small # of teams invited to play for the championship; two, to be precise), but ... with 64 teams getting in, it does kind of seem like a lot of teams get invited to postseason college basketball, but there really aren't. Comparitively, it's a pretty small percentage.
I don't know. It might be a little selfish of me to want to deprive more student-athletes of a shot at postseason play, just because I like a neat little bracket. It might be. I'll reconsider my position as long as the NCAA promises that whatever they come up with, it will fit nicely on one sheet, and I'll still have five days to fill it out.
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