So how many is too many?
The Football Championship Subdivision playoff field has already been expanded from 16 to 20 teams starting in 2010, although the league hasn’t yet announced the format.
We don’t know yet about first-round byes and whether true seeding will be used, since currently just the top four teams are seeded.
As what has been explained as a cost-saving measure, pairings are localized, thus bringing last season probably what was a Top-10 team in South Dakota State to face the No. 1 seeded Grizzlies in the first round.
How was that for a reward for an undefeated season? And what about the second round, when a badly outmanned Stephen F. Austin, which probably would have been eliminated in the first round given true seeding, was blasted by Montana 51-0?
But that’s football and, along with the host spot for the championship game, it’s yet to be determined. After all, I’m immersed in the throes of the second half of Big Sky Conference basketball season.
So I ask again, how many is too many?
In its infinite wisdom the National Collegiate Athletic Association has formed a committee, on which Big Sky Conference Commissioner Doug Fullerton sits, to study expanding the post-season basketball tournament playoff field from 65 – since it added a play-in game several years ago – to 96.
Also, several years ago the Association established a round of what it call “Bracket Buster” games placed near the end of the season, supposedly to separate bubble teams from different conferences and make it easier for the committee to select at-large berths for post-season tournament play.
I suppose I subscribe to the theory that when a “bubble team” from the Big East meets a team with a similar record from the Big 10 the outcome could illustrate which team is more deserving of a post-season nod.
The problem is the NCAA decided to arrange too many Bracket Buster games that involve teams that have no chance of getting into the tournament and lure leagues like the Big Sky Conference to participate with promises of national television exposure – which rarely happens.
If you are selected as a Bracket Buster road team, your opponent has to return to your home floor the following season.
That part of the equation is a good thing for schools like the University of Montana and probably the Big Sky Conference.
Getting a team to come to Missoula or to establish a two-game home and home schedule is a daunting task, partially because it is difficult for an opponent to win at Dahlberg Arena. It is also a costly venture because of airline prices and unpredictable weather makes travel challenging.
But I digress. How many is too many?
In my opinion the NCAA basketball tournament is one of sport’s greatest spectacles. The pairings are highly anticipated, exciting and unpredictable and promote as much Monday morning water cooler discussion as any event in the world including the Super Bowl.
Cinderella teams jump up and bite highly seeded and heavily favored storied programs and the last-second drama and superb TV coverage seemingly of every eventuality – not bad for a radio guy huh – makes for the best of sports television.
There will always be sour grapes about the 66th team that deserved to get in and was bumped because a league champion was upset in their conference tournament and an additional unexpected team from an automatic bid conference had to be placed in the field.
But with 96 teams the discussion remains the same about the 97th, 98th and 99th team that was left out of the field.
The additional tier, of course, is all about money and additional television revenue, but what about the watering down of sport’s finest post-season event? Mediocrity should not be rewarded. Deserving teams have the chance to play their way into the tournament because of, in most cases at least, their league tournament. Leave it alone!
How many is too many?