This debate feels like it centers on a few things that Medina strongly holds which most other folks either disagree with or don't care about.
1. That it is deeply unfair for teams that missed opportunities presented to them be replaced by a different caste of teams with considerably less opportunity (well, that said schools are given a clean opportunity at all)
2. That chasing more competitive games for about half of two days is something that should be made a priority.
IMHO that's how I read Medina's posts as well.
Regarding the first point, I have a fundamental disagreement that there is some deep lack of fairness for mediocre power conference teams to not be in the tournament.
Last year, for example, Purdue was sweating the bubble. We were a decent team in a brutally difficult conference. As a fan, of course I wanted my team to get into the tournament, but I didn't think that Purdue "deserved" a bid just because we were better than those tallest midgets. I knew Purdue wasn't a team with
any chance to make a deep run, so it would have been a "we're just happy to be here" luxury. They certainly didn't do anything last season that would have been deserving.
So I don't see anything unfair about teams with no chance at a deep run who haven't accomplished anything not getting in, while teams with no chance of a deep run who HAVE accomplished something getting in. Maybe winning a 1-bid league's conference tourney isn't as difficult as going 9-11 in the B1G regular season, but all you can do is win the games in front of you.
What I do think is that college sports in general is a deeply unfair process to begin with. Players are secured via recruiting rather than a draft, so it makes it much more of a "haves vs have-nots" system rather than a parity system. As such, I think that one of the things that I like about the NCAAT is the fundamental fairness. Win your conference, you're in. That's it. Simple. You control your destiny. Win and you're in.
It may not happen often, but I find it FAR more entertaining to see some team I've never even heard of seeded at #14 beat a big-name #3. I root for it. Those kids are getting to play on the world stage for potentially the only time they'll ever get a chance in their lives. How is that not more meaningful than a mediocre power conference team in that same spot? I know nothing about UMBC other than them knocking off #1 UVA, but I'm going to have that in my head as a trivia question possibly the rest of my life. Would I care as much if that was a mediocre power conference team?
I like things the way they are.
I would do two things:
- Make the auto-bid the conference's regular season champion. I know this will never happen because the conferences make money from their conference tournaments, but it's always seemed like proving yourself the best over an 18 game conference schedule should be rewarded than getting a lucky run of a few games. This would also improve the quality of those tallest midgets.
- I agree with Medina that the play-ins, if they have to exist (I'd go back to 64 or at least 65), should all be the 16-seeds. I find it odd that 11-seed teams have to participate in play-in games. Those teams are FAR stronger than the 16 seeds. I think it was purely a money situation where the NCAA realized nobody would care about the play-in if they were only the 16s. At least if you have a couple major conference teams in the play-in, basketball fans might tune in for both games each play-in night rather than tuning in for zero games because nobody cares about the 16s.
