By Riley Hauser-
Every year, in one Sunday in March, many Americans watch the NCAA Tournament Selection Show, hoping their team gets picked for college basketball’s most prestigious tournament. They watch, as super small teams that just a handful of people have heard of, like LIU-Brooklyn and Southern University, get into the NCAA Tournament, just to get demolished in a blowout. This all happens, because they were the champions in a small conference with even smaller schools that even fewer people have heard of. This is a problem that the NCAA needs to fix. They need every bid to be an at-large bid, with no automatic bids into the tournament.

As of right now, there are 31 automatic NCAA Tournament bids, all by winning conference titles. Some are big conferences, like the Big 12 and ACC, who annually yield powerhouse teams such as Kansas and Duke respectively, but others are SWAC, whose tournament representative this year is 1-8 all time, losing these games by a combined 125 points, and only holding it to single digits once. There is also the MEAC, who sent North Carolina A&T (who is that?), who has gone a combined 1-10, losing by a combined 187 points, with its one win in a play-in game, which was followed by a 31 point drubbing by Louisville this year (I know, totally exciting). This leaves the rest of the nation’s 316 teams to go after the last 37 spots.
Some may say that there areprobably only 37 “decent teams” left, but that’s not true. There is Iowa, who had four-point and three-point losses to Sweet Sixteen teams Indiana and Michigan State. There is also Virginia, who only lost by four at 2-seeded Miami, and beat another two seed, Duke, by five at home. So unlike what some may say, there still are many quality teams left out there in the field.

Some may ask, what about the cinderella teams? The small teams with no expectation that make it somewhere? Well, although it would do away with most of those teams, they would be replaced. Many teams are called a Cinderella team, just because they are a low seed. Nobody would be gushing over Florida Gulf Coast if they were a two seed. The same would be for Virginia Commonwealth, who was the great Cinderella team two years ago. These teams would be replaced. They would be replaced by better teams, like Iowa and Virginia, who could go further and reach new heights for low seeds.
Right now, there are seven or eight games a year in the NCAA Tournament, when the one seed takes on a sixteen seed and the two vs fifteen seeds play, that are absolutely boring, dampened blowout games. The one seeds practically get byes, winning all 116 matchups, mostly in blowouts, and a two seed has only lost seven times in the round of 64. These stats could change to the better, with more interesting matchups, and better games if every bid was at large, because the 16 seed would be better than 15-20 Liberty.

In this, I am not saying automatic bids are bad, I mean the tournament is still exciting now, I am just saying it would be better. There wouldn’t be as many boring blowouts. There would be more close games, with a greater number of last-minute wins (who doesn’t like that?). If the NCAA got rid of automatic bids, the NCAA Tournament would be a lot more interesting.

Fun Facts:
*Of the seven 15 seeds to beat a two seed, only one has won a second game (2013 Florida Gulf Coast).

*This year (2013) was the first time three seeds below twelve made the Sweet Sixteen (#12 Oregon, #13 LaSalle, #15 Florida Gulf Coast).