On NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament Expansion

There has been a lot of talk about expanding the NCAA Division I Basketball Tournament on the men’s side from 65 to 96 teams. As a result, there is also talk of altering the women’s side of the tournament as well. Some suggestions make more sense than others.

For the purpose of symmetry, some suggest that the women, too, should expand to a 96-team tournament. The claim is that the “mid-major” conference teams would be better able to show what they could do. Um….have you actually watched a women’s NCAA tournament? It’s not exactly Upset City. While the talent pool has steadily deepened across the nation, the fact of the matter is that women’s basketball has a larger stratification than is the case on the men’s side.

Part of this difference is the fact that the top women’s players don’t punk-out on their schools nearly as often as the top men’s players. They fulfill their scholarships. They overwhelmingly earn their degrees. As a result, the women’s programs who attract the best talent tend to hold on to that talent. On the men’s side, with the top talent treating schools as little more than minor-league way stations, the larger pool of not-quite-star-but-very-talented players is larger and spread further. While expanding the tournament to 96 teams might allow the men’s side to include more teams who are worthy to compete, I don’t think that’s likely to happen on the women’s side as of yet.

If the purpose is to improve competition in the tournament, perhaps the automatic bids need to be reconsidered. As of now, every conference champion gets to go to the big dance regardless of the strength of their conference. As a result, better schools from the major and mid-major conferences are excluded so that a team ranked (say) #200 but who won their conference gets to be skunked by the national #1 team by 50 points. Except for the small tournament bonus paid to the schools, this really doesn’t do anyone any good.

Another idea floated around is moving the women’s season (and tournament) back a couple of weeks so that it can shine on its own and not have to fight against the glare of the men’s tournament. This might not be a terrible idea. The major problem might be venues as the men’s conference tournaments would be going on at this time. Still, it’s something to consider.

One thing I would like to see is seeding being done via tiers instead of the ladder system currently in place. Since we have four brackets, we start there. Tier A would be the top four teams; Tier B would be #5-8 (four teams); Tier C #9-16 (eight teams); Tier D #17-32 (sixteen teams); Tier E #33-64 (thirty-two teams). From the Final Four down to the first round, you seed teams in that tier randomly.

Under the current system, in the first round #1 will meet #64, #2 will face #63, and so forth in what is designed to be a coronation run for the top seeds. The only real contests happen with the middle seeds of a round as they are relatively evenly matched. With a tiered system, the first round could see #1 face #33 — which would sort of suck for #33 (or any of the lower 32 teams chosen to play #1). On the other hand, #64 could end up facing #32 in a game more likely to be a contest.  It’s probable that the final outcome of the tournament will be substantially altered, but the earlier rounds will hold out the promise of being more competitive, especially for the teams not in power conferences.

A continuing problem the NCAA has struggled with has been how to handle women’s tournament venues. Just about every method has been attempted at this point. Many host schools, if their team doesn’t make the tournament, lose significant money for programs that don’t make money in the first place. It may be best to return to having selected schools host at least the first two rounds of play. An interesting twist might be to have the lower seed host the first round(s) of play. It evens out the top-seed advantage just a little, but more than that, it’s likely to generate more interest in the game (and more future revenue) at the lower seeded school. Have the third and fourth rounds played at the higher seed’s court, and then the Final Four at a neutral venue.

Or something like that.

There is a lot of tinkering that can be done with the current system. I don’t think that expanding the women’s field is a good option. In fact, I think it’s a recipe for an extra round of non-competitive contests. Still, even with a 64-team field, there are many options to be had. Perhaps what the NCAA needs to do is take its head out of a men’s basketball mindset and focus only on what would be best for the women’s game overall.