No More NIT As We Knew It

The best thing about the NCAA Tournament is the upsets.  Every year, there's at least one mid-major school or champion of a small conference that beats a Power 6 team or, even if they don't get the win, they make it a game.  There's always that Cinderella team that America falls in love with, and it's usually a team from outside the Power 6 where the country is finding out just how good they are.  As it turns out, there are some pretty good teams outside the six major conferences and Gonzaga.

There are also plenty of good teams that lose in their conference tournament at don't get to play in the Big Dance as a result.  Those teams were always guaranteed to at least play in the postseason, though, since the NIT gave an automatic bid to any regular season conference champion that didn't make the NCAA Tournament.  It was a nice reward for a good season that no one seemed to have an issue with and most actually agreed was a good thing.

So, of course, leave it to the NCAA to take something good and mess with it.  Because those NIT auto bids for regular season champions are now a thing of the past.  Instead, they've been replaced by something no one asked for.  The "top two teams" from each of the six major conferences that didn't make the tournament, regardless of record, will not only be guaranteed an NIT bid, they'll also be guaranteed a home game.

Who exactly was clamoring for the mediocre ninth- and 10th-place teams in the Big Ten or 10th- and 11-place teams in the ACC to be in the NIT over a 28-4 Conference USA team that lost in the semifinals on a buzzer beater?  That Conference USA would actually want to play in the NIT, by the way.  While the Power 6 team almost certainly would not.  Especially if that team is at or below .500 overall.  (North Carolina actually declined to even be considered for the NIT last season.)

And what if they fired their coach?  Or if they have players who are either entering the NBA Draft or the transfer portal?  It's already become a pretty regular thing for NFL Draft prospects to opt out of playing in their team's bowl game.  Why would it be any different in basketball?  The NCAA Tournament is one thing.  Meaningless NIT games are something else entirely.

Frankly, that's the reason the higher-seeded teams end up losing their first- or second-round home games in the NIT.  Because their opponent is much more motivated than they are.  The teams that know they're headed to the NIT play like they want to be there.  The ones that just miss the NCAA Tournament play like they don't.  I'm not sure how guaranteeing more disappointed major conference teams NIT bids will make that any better.

Last season's NIT final was between two Conference USA teams--North Texas and UAB.  While not a sexy matchup, it ended up being a pretty good game.  I don't even think ESPN, which has had exclusive broadcast rights to the NIT for years, minded the matchup.  I suspect it was the host committee in Las Vegas, which now hosts the NIT semifinals and championship game.  They want the "sexy" matchup, even if it's entirely unsexy.

It's also worth mentioning that there was also very little actual need to make this declaration.  Five of the six major conferences had at least two teams in last year's NIT.  The only one that didn't was the Big 12, which placed seven teams in the NCAA Tournament and had an eighth team, Oklahoma State, just miss out and get the top overall seed in the NIT instead.  So, that's eight of 10 conference teams in either the NCAA Tournament or NIT.  New Big 12 members Cincinnati and Central Florida also played in the NIT last season, when they were both in the American.

All four No. 1 seeds, which automatically go to the "First Four Out" of the NCAA Tournament, were from Power 6 conferences.  While they didn't all host due to some having scheduling conflicts, nine of the 16 seeded teams came from the six leagues.  So, qualification and representation for the major conferences in the NIT wasn't even actually an issue.  It seems unlikely that they'd get more than two or three teams per conference, anyway, since it's only a 32-team field and most of the 36 NCAA at-large selections will come from those same six conferences.

What that means is the NIT is "stuck" with only a handful of middle-of-the-road major conference teams to choose from.  The rest of the field is primarily going to be mid-majors anyway.  Even with those two guaranteed spots for the Power 6, they'll still need to take multiple teams from leagues like the Mountain West or Missouri Valley or American.  What I fear is that those teams are the ones who'll suffer.  Because this announcement sure made it seem like their biggest concern is no longer how good a team is.  It's what conference they're in above anything else.

Now, there's an easy compromise here.  The rest of the 20-team NIT field will be filled by at-large teams.  The number of NIT auto bids that ended up going to regular season conference champions was generally anywhere between eight and 10.  So why not give 8-10 of those 20 remaining spots to the regular season conference champions?  But, that idea actually makes sense, so of course they won't do it.

Once even bigger than the NCAA Tournament, the NIT's prominence has dropped significantly.  It received a little boost after the launch of those other (unnecessary) Division I postseason tournaments, but is still nothing like what it once was.  It still meant something, though.  Including the regular season conference champions gave it that meaning.  Those teams knew they were still going to the postseason, and, if all went well and they reached the semifinals, they had a chance to play in Madison Square Garden, where all the biggest college basketball games are played.

Then they moved the finals out of Madison Square Garden and diminished the NIT even further.  This latest move pushes the event further towards irrelevance.  Because they're essentially turning it into the Independence Bowl (or whichever other December bowl game between 6-6 teams you prefer).  It's a self-inflicted wound, too.  There was no reason to take something everybody loves about college basketball (the chance of the low-major team pulling an upset against one of the big boys) and get rid of it simply so the Power 6 conferences could have even more opportunity.

With what college sports has become, however, this sadly could've been predicted.  That's why I'm not surprised by it.  Not in the slightest.  Especially not with the next round of expansion coming next year and a pair of 18-team conferences on the way.  There's only 100 spots available between the NCAA Tournament and NIT.  Only 68 of those are at-large teams.  You knew it was just a matter of time until they started looking for a way for the same conferences to get as many of those 68 as possible.  The little guys be damned!  Congratulations on your 28-4 season.  You really should've won your conference tournament, though.  Because why would we pick you for the NIT when we can take a 15-17 Illinois team instead?