This new segment will be looking at various WHAT IF possibilities and scenarios for entertainment and speculative purposes only :-)
What If Tubby Smith goes to the NBA?
What if Tubby is offered boatloads of money to coach in the NBA? What if he gets tired of unsatisfied KY fans who expect a Final Four every year and a national championship every four years? Then where does Kentucky go to? Here are some what-if names: Rick Majerus is a familiar face they remember from the 1998 championship. But is he in the proper physical shape and can he recruit high-profile early-entry top 100 players? Larry Brown is available, but he's a professional journeyman. On top of that, he wasn't patient enough to play rookies and younger players in the NBA, so who would he play in college since they are at the same age? How about Mike Montgomerry? He won many games at Stanford, an improbable place to have a basketball power program, but how many Final Fours did he go to despite having top seeds and highly rated teams with NBA talent? Just one. Probably not good enough for demanding KY fans. How about Billy Donovan? Before he won the championship last year, that could be a very reasonable thing to consider, but why would he leave now on the verge of a Repeat? How about Rick Pitino returning? That could cause riots... How about Kyle Macy? Well, you don't want to risk another "Matt Doherty situation"... The good thing with "What If" questions is that they can be left open-ended and unanswered :-)
What If the NCAA tourney expands?
Logistics aside, here are some ideas on how to expand the NCAA tourney. I say logistics aside because making any changes would require changing the schedule of conference tourneys and the start of the NCAAs
1) Take the Last Four In and make them play the Last Four Out in a double-header made-for-TV event on a neutral court in a tourney-style environment.
1A) Use the S-curve to determine these eight teams playing for four at-large bids. This would be the most conservative approach
1B) Now if the NCAA wants to be brave, bold and creative, they can pick the top 4 remaining "BCS" teams and match them up with the top 4 remaining "non-BCS" teams, and let them face-off each other. It could create extra-buzz and higher ratings, a Bracket Buster event of greater importance.
2) Do the same as #1 but instead play-in 6 or 8 bids, again made for TV. Essentially a limited expansion of the field, without having to jump to 96 or 128
What if the "BCS" conferences got all the at large bids?
Right now 34 bids are at-large and 31 are automatic. "BCS" conferences, the Big 6 "power" conferences, get most of the 34, but not all of them. So let's look at a hypothetical, alternate reality where Billy Packer and his BCS homer friends get their wish and all 34 bids are given to them. Those along with the six automatic bids would put 40 "BCS" teams in the NCAA. So who gets the bids??? Please note that the intend of this post is not to predict exactly who is in and out, but rather make a WHAT IF statement. The order of the teams and their classification of In/Out is off the top of my head, I have not looked at extensive numbers and schedules yet
In (more or less) (total of 25)
In or Out? - 15 of the 21 teams below would get an NCAA bid!!!
So if you drop the last team from each conference listed above, you have the 40 "BCS" bids. Sounds very BCS-friendly as you can see a number of "shaky" teams making to the NCAA. Re-arrange the order if you like, add/drop a couple of teams, but the result is more or less the same: Middle of the road teams getting NCAA bids.
Fortunately this scenario can only happen in Billy Packer's DreamLand. A number of non-BCS teams have already earned or will have earned at-large bids by March 11. Here are some examples:
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