Okay so a simple look at this year's bracket as of 11:25am PST shows a lot of upsets. In fact if we isolate match ups between teams not in the 1-16, 2-15, and 8-9 games the record of underdogs vs top dogs is 5 wins to 5 losses. Complete parody. As I look at the scoreboard now Cornell a 12 seed is up big on #5 Temple and #6 Xavier is about to beat #11 Minnesota. So the records will remain the same. Every year 14,13,12,11,and 10 seeds do very well in their first round match ups. Almost always these seedings are reserved for the best of the Mid-majors and a few of those who just got into the tournament from major conferences.
So what does it mean that these underdogs (ranked 40-56 in the tournament) are even with the teams that would are ranked 9-25 by the tournament selection committee? I think it simply means that beyond the top 10 programs in any given year there is very little separation in terms of talent and coaching. Today, top programs get to keep top players for only 1-2 years while lower ranked programs get good players who are able to develop over 4 years and can often outsmart and outwork their younger more talented counterparts from major conferences. This is good for college basketball and certainly makes it more enjoyable for me to watch. However what it does argue for is less weight on "power conference" teams.
Okay so in light of my conservative consumption bent in this blog I have some tournament set up suggestions. Today the tournament is set up into regions (west, midwest, east, south, or whatever...). It would be a much more sustainable solution and more profitable solution if geographically-named regions really meant something. The West region bracket should include only west region teams. That way travel itineraries are shorted, less wasteful, and the fans a the games will remain interested in the match ups outside of the team they came to follow. Additionally, teams could take pride and say we won the western region championship this year. Then western region fans might cheer for their champion as they play in the final 4.
Who would get into the regional round of 16 teams? It cannot be for instance 8 Pac-10 teams in the hypothetical western region tournament. Each region would have to be divided up well enough to make a rule that each conference champion would get a bid plus a few at-large bigs. The at-large bigs could be decided similarly to how they are now, but only compared with other teams from your region. Clearly this is just one of many ideas. Tournament organizers are now considering a mega tournament with 96 teams. This would not be a more sustainable solution. We can see that as we get past the 56th "best" teams each year the quality of the product declines somewhat. However, by keeping things regional perhaps each region could make different rules and decide their own bracket qualifications and sizes.
I wonder what the tournament organizers would think of this idea?
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