By ALAN SNEL
LVSportsBiz.com
There’s power in commercial brands.
And that brings us to the NCAA men’s national 68-team basketball tournament also known as March Madness of The Big Dance.
Every time the teams are seeded in four regional brackets, I can’t help but think the 10 folks on the tourney selection committee is influenced by the brand power of North Carolina or Kentucky or Kansas and the TV ratings power of players such as Trae Young.
Google, Yahoo, Facebook. North Carolina, Kentucky, Kansas.
Nordstroms, Macy’s. Duke, UCLA
There’s power in names.
So, there’s this 10-member committee of college athletic directors, conference commissioners and university executives, who decides the 68 teams, the seedings and match-ups.
And the members swear on a pile of beach baskets that the science of bracketology is based on something called Quadrant 1 wins and RPI ratings.
But politics and teams with special name power?
No role in determining the 68-team field, says a fella named Bruce Rasmussen, the athletic director who chairs the 10-member tourney selection panel.
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UNLV is no where to be seen in the Big Dance after a season that began so well petered out with a missed Jovan Mooring three-point shot against Nevada-Reno in the Mountain West tourney last week.’
But Las Vegas still has a special place in March Madness. Millions and millions of dollars will be wagered illegally from office pools to bookies. But there will be an influx of college hoops fans who will fill sports books along the Strip and across the valley, so it’s a tourism money-maker and sports books’ revenue-generator.
With 68 teams in the mix, there are nationwide variety ranging bluebloods like North Carolina and Kentucky to unheralded underdogs like University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC). The selection of the at-large teams and seedings were the fodder of a sports talking heads who wondered how a hot Arizona club fresh off a Pac-12 title secured at T-Mobile Arena Saturday night can be seeded so low as a number four seed to how a team with 10 losses (North Carolina) can draw a number two seed.
Then, there’s Oklahoma, with had a mediocre 8-10 conference record, an overall record of 18-13 and an anointed TV ratings machine-maker named Trae Young. Did you say TV ratings? Young and the Sooners basketeers made the Big Dance with a number 10 seed.
And how about Arizona State? Like Oklahoma, it finished its conference record with an 8-10 record in the Pac-12. But Arizona State and its 20-11 record — coached by a well-known college basketball name, former Duke star Bobby Hurley– made it as an 11th seed and will play a play-in game against Syracuse Wednesday night.
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Does the committee want a quick exit for Arizona, under the cloud of a player payment investigation and an FBI controversy involving the team’s volatile coach, Sean Miller?
Arizona had the best Pac-12 record at 14-4 and won the conference tourney in Las Vegas, finishing with a 27-7 record. Arizona also has arguably college basketball’s most dominant player in center Deandre Ayton.
Assuming Arizona dispatches Buffalo in the first round, Arizona will likely play a fast-rising Kentucky squad, fresh off its SEC tourney title. And if Arizona beats Kentucky, there’s a possible South Region semifinal showdown with the tourney’s overall number one ranked club — Virginia (31-2).
With Arizona out, there’s no chatter about investigations distracting viewers.
And when you’re receiving $857 million in NCAA hoops tourney/March Madness broadcast rights this year, you don’t want attention on FBI investigations.
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