NCAA Tournament: A Review On The Basketball Field

March Madness



The popular name given to The NCAA Men’s Basketball

Tournament is March Madness. This is considered as the

most prestigious championship game ever held in

American Collegiate sports. Even the baseball playoffs

don’t seem to match the 7 seeds of the best of the

best round in the championship. NCAA is indeed the

height of sports in the making. Sixty-five teams go

inside the battlefield, only one remains standing.



Tournament Field



The field is composed of 65 teams. Thirty-four of

which is selected by the committee and is determined

by bids "at-large". The other 31 proceeds to the

conference championship. Most of those who proceeded

are chosen to be in smaller tournaments done after the

season. Usually this takes place during the first week

of March.



65 Teams?



Got that right. Sixty-five teams are going to battle

it out. This is because NCAA didn’t want teams get

eliminated at-large bids. Instead, they added

"play-ins". This is the part when number 64 and 65

face off and the team who wasn’t squashed can have the

chance to play with the number one seeds.



One fact that you have to be aware of and is very

evident in the play-in game is: it’s not what you put

inside the brackets that you filled out in your pool

or on a website.



Lingo



What in the world are seeds, RPI, regions and ranks?



When the 64 teams split, they are sectioned into 4

regions. The selection committee set up the particular

regions. This committee is responsible for making it a

point that every region must be equal in strength and

weakness.



Seedings are not the same when talking about rankings.



Every team is seeded equally based on their abilities.

How does seeding take place? Theoretically speaking,

seeding happens upon hailing the best players. Those 4

teams chosen as the best becomes seed number 1, the

next best as seed number 2, and the seeding goes on.



Seeding is said to be specific until the tournament

ends. It is not interchangeable. Unlike in rankings,

the team’s performance is defined. It can be

manipulated through the entire game by how good a

team’s game went. Rankings are unofficial and are

gathered through polls generated through the

sportswriter’s decision.



Next, RPI, which stands for three words - ratings,

percentage, index. This is the strict mathematical

method of ranking each team. RPI is somewhat a

secretive attempt to rank a team. Guess that added up

to the confusion. But that would be all right, the

important thing is, you have grasp at least something.



Schedule



A tournament schedule is not actually fixed. It can

change every year, including the location. Although

the sequence is forever the same.



The first week within the month of March is called as

the Championship Week. This is the time when the

tournament’s championship games are held. The Sunday

wherein the Championship Weekends is called as the

Selection Sunday. It is held on a late Sunday

afternoon.



Sweet Sixteen is the term given for the 16 teams that

qualify after the first weekend has passed. These 16

who remains will be divided into two. The first 8 will

play on a Thursday and the next 8 on a Friday. After

the two Sundays and Saturdays that passed, the Final

Four is announced.