March Madness is commonly viewed as the best postseason tournament in all sports. It’s the unexpected upsets, legends born and that one shining moment every fan, coach and player chase that define the event. But now the NCAA wants to compromise this feeling by expanding the tournament for a few extra dollars.
On April 3, the day before the 2026 Final Four started, the Sports Business Journal reported that the NCAA is “expected to finalize an expansion of the men’s and women’s tournaments to 76 teams” — something that NCAA President Charlie Baker has been insistent upon.
“It bummed me out that they didn’t get in,” he said, referencing certain teams that didn’t make the 68-team bracket.
This is a ridiculous excuse to change the most entertaining tournament in American sports. Expanding the tournament does nothing but give mediocre, rich power conference schools an opportunity to get into the tournament, minimizing the impact of the fan-favorite mid and low majors.
It all starts and ends with money.
Instead of catering to the real fans and preserving to college basketball’s integrity, tournament expansion helps only the greedy executives, who care most about making their wallets even thicker. More teams mean more games, meaning more opportunities to generate revenue through broadcasts, tickets, concessions, merchandise, etc. March Madness viewership only keeps growing, and the NCAA is trying to capitalize on this.
Ross Dellenger of Yahoo Sports put it best when he reported on the tournament’s inevitable expansion.
“In the most financially stressful time in college athletics history, the power leagues are aggressively seeking more access and revenue in NCAA championship,” he said.
A common argument for expansion is the potential for more meaningful postseason games, which could be a good thing. In all sports, the playoffs are supposed to bring the best of the best to compete in a tense win-or-go-home situation.
But all expanding the tournament will do is lower the bar of entry, which will simultaneously minimize the impact. It will pit underserving teams with underwhelming resumes against each other in a meeting of mediocrity. The exact opposite of the postseason’s point.
The tournament has been expanded before, and it has largely led to thoughtless games between sloppy teams. We can look at past years’ First Four games as examples.
The 2024 matchup between Colorado State and Virginia was a memorable one. Virginia lost in embarrassing fashion, only scoring 42 points. Colorado State won handily in an eyesore of a game and then lost in the next round to Texas and only scored 44 points. Similar events happened in 2025 with North Carolina vs. San Diego State and 2022 with Indiana vs. Wyoming.
It feels like every year, the biggest takeaway from the First Four is that further expansion would further diminish the product.
The Big Sky Conference Commissioner Tom Wistrcill commented on the pressures from power conferences to change the event to fulfill their own desires.
“This is the greatest three weeks on the planet,” he said. “But it’s our job to protect this event. There are pressures and the Power Four have shared that with us. We’re not putting our heads in the sand.”
The committee overvalues power conference schedules when it comes to at-large seedings. Just look at Miami Ohio. They went undefeated in the regular season and yet the committee still sent them to Dayton, citing the limited strength of schedule as to why. Further expansion will solely enlarge this problem.
These games lower the high standard of competition in the tournament. Expanding drains the energy from the regular season, lowering the cost of losing for power conference programs. Instead of treating every game as essential, power conference teams gain a margin of error while mid majors are left with none.
College basketball executives are money hungry, and they are threatening to ruin a highly watched tournament in favor of their own greed. Tournament expansion is a mistake and exists to provide a simpler way for mediocre big schools to get into a tournament they don’t deserve.
The homegrown emotion of college basketball is being lost. As NIL and the transfer portal continue to shape the sport, the integrity of the tournament must be protected to preserve the tradition of March Madness.
This story was written by Owen Parker. He can be reached at [email protected].
