The Times, They Ain't A Changin

Part of the ritual of March Madness is the annual complaints about the start time of the men's Championship Game.  Even though it's been at 9:00 for my entire life, that somehow still seems to surprise people every year.  And, even among the people who do know it's always at 9:00, the common refrain is that it starts "too late."  Well, as I said, the start time has been the same for 40 years, so don't expect it to be changing anytime soon!  And, frankly, there's no reason to change it.  If there was, they would've done it already.

Most of the complaining about the 9:00 start time comes from the East Coast, where people don't want to stay up until 11:30 to see the end.  Except, here's the thing that those people forget...9:00 on the East Coast is 6:00 on the West Coast.  And the game is on a Monday.  So, if you start any earlier, people on the West Coast aren't able to watch the start of the game.  Because they're still on the way home from work!

Also, how often is the Final Four actually played on the East Coast?  Almost never.  In fact, Atlanta, Indianapolis and Detroit are the only cities in the Eastern time zone that even have the domed football stadiums with the appropriate seating capacity, and two of them are in the Midwest!  The others are all in the Central and Pacific time zones....where the game starts at either 8:00 or 6:00 local time!  That's certainly more convenient for fans attending the game in those Midwestern cities.

It's also worth noting that we're talking about a two-hour basketball game here.  Even with the longer timeouts and extra commercials during the NCAA Tournament, games still run in the 2:10-2:15 range.  Which means that even with a 9:20 tip-off (which, again, has been the standard for years), the game's ending at around 11:30 and CBS/TBS is signing off at about midnight.  Sure, overtime makes it end later, but even with overtime, the game itself will still end at like 11:45 at the latest.

I understand why some people on the East Coast consider that "too late," but there aren't really many alternatives here.  It's a Monday night!  Prime time TV on weeknights starts at 8:00, so it's not starting before 8, and that wouldn't account for a pregame show (and the important sponsors it attracts).  And, even if you were to split the difference and go with an 8:30 start, it would actually be an 8:45 tip-off, so it's still ending around 11, which will still be "too late" for some fans (and way too early for some others).

That complaining about the start time of the final has now spilled over to the women's side, as well.  Last year, the Women's Championship Game was moved to 3:00 on Sunday afternoon, with the broadcast switched from ESPN to ABC.  The afternoon slot on the more widely-distributed network has resulted in record ratings for both finals that have been on ABC (the fact that they both featured Caitlin Clark certainly helped, too).  ESPN's new contract with the NCAA starts next season, and you can bet the Sunday afternoon Women's Championship Game is also here to stay.

With the women, it's the opposite complaint.  Many people feel that 3:00 is too early.  They'd rather the start be later in the afternoon or even during the evening.  There are even some who'd like to see Sunday night, citing the success of Sunday Night Football as their rationale.  While a later start may be possible, Sunday night's not gonna happen.

Sunday is one of ABC's strongest and most consistent nights in the Spring.  America's Funniest Home Videos comes on at 7 and is the lead-in to American Idol.  Do you really think ABC's gonna run the risk of American Idol starting late because the basketball game ran long?  Absolutely no chance!  And I doubt they're willing to mess with AFV, their Sunday night staple, either, which means the Women's Championship Game needs to be off the air by 7.

The biggest problem with the women's game doesn't even seem to be the 3:00 start as much as the fact that ABC only allotted two-and-a-half hours for the game.  That led to a very awkward situation where they began the postgame show just before 5:30, only for ABC to abruptly go off the air and cut to commercial before switching to other programming (which, in a lot of markets, was an infomercial).  Postgame coverage continued on ESPN, but they didn't tell people that, making the cut away even more abrupt.

This, really, is a very easy problem to fix.  Instead of only staying on the air until 5:30, go that extra half hour until 6:00.  That gives them a little more flexibility for overtime, too.  Tip-off between South Carolina and Iowa was at pretty much 3:00 on the nose.  That extra half hour, though, would allow them to move the tip-off to 3:10-3:15 and still leave plenty of time for the trophy presentation and postgame, even if there's overtime.  Then they can still go to the local news at 6 or, worst-case, preempt the local news and allow AFV to start on time at 7.

Starting any earlier isn't really possible since 3:00 Eastern is noon Pacific.  Starting later sounds good in theory, but the number of people who've watched in the last two years when it started at 3 suggest they've found a time that works for most fans.  So, even going to 4:00 doesn't seem like a viable option.  Not just because it would potentially impact ABC's Sunday night schedule, but because what they're already doing is working fine.  Which is why I suggest only pushing it back a little and extending the postgame until 6:00.

ESPN's contract with the NCAA included increased exposure for all women's sports, not just basketball.  And that Sunday at 3:00 timeslot is when the women's sports have typically been featured.  The volleyball championship match was in that spot in December.  With the expanded women's offerings in the new contract, they'll likely continue to fall in that Sunday at 3:00 timeslot.  If that's already been established as the start time, why mess with it?

And, let's not forget, the women pulled in a record number of viewers this year...with the game starting at 3:00.  The Women's Championship Game even outdrew the Men's Championship Game for the first time, which can also be attributed to the move to ABC (this was a TBS year for the men, so it wouldn't surprise me if that impacted the ratings).  Moving the game to ABC was obviously the right move.  So, even if it was ABC who decided on the 3:00 start time, that's a trade-off the NCAA is absolutely willing to make.  The wisdom behind it has already been proven.

So, it doesn't look like the NCAA is in any rush to change the start time of either basketball Championship Game.  Some fans may be inconvenienced by the men's game starting "too late" or the women's game starting "too early," but that hasn't stopped people from watching.  And it looks like they'll continue to watch the men on Monday at 9 and the women on Sunday at 3.  So, they'd better get used to it.