A 96-team tournament: Umm, no!

There’s been a lot of talk lately about expanding the NCAA men’s basketball tournament to 96 teams. Does anyone else think this is a bad idea?

The powers that be – mainly NCAA administrators, so-called “power conference” officials and some university presidents – want to expand the tournament in order to expand lucrative TV rights deals and grow licensing agreements. But they’re thinking with their pocketbooks, not their heads.

You don’t have to be a college basketball fan to know that the tournament is a big deal. People love this stuff. It consumes much of America (and American TV time) for more than three weeks, bringing beneficial publicity and great opportunities for success to smaller schools and lesser-known athletes in particular. But it’s just fine the way it is. Need proof: Look no further than the drama, and plethora of great finishes and upsets in this year’s tourney.

It’s working, so why change it? Adding another 31 teams cheapens what it means to make the tournament, not to mention that it would prolong a sporting event that sometimes feels like it takes six months to play anyhow.

There are plenty of opportunities for teams who don’t make the Big Dance to play in the postseason, with the tradition-rich NIT and newer College Basketball Invitational. And if the NCAA tournament is expanded, just to make sure no team is left out, I’m sure plans are already being made for a new postseason tournament – the I Couldn’t Care Less Classic. My sources say that organizers for the new ICCLC have already arranged a sweet TV rights package: Games will be aired on a small Guatemalan television station between 3 and 6 a.m.

College basketball and March Madness are great the way they are. Like my dad -- who happens to be a huge college hoops fan -- says, “If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it!”