NCAA Tournament expands to 68 teams
Today, the National Collegiate Athletic Association announced that it has entered into a new broadcast rights agreement with CBS and Turner, and has expanded the Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament to 68 teams beginning in 2011. The announcement comes amid speculation that the tournament could have been grown to as many as 96 teams, and occurs before a July 31 deadline for changing the broadcast rights agreement. The new tournament increases the ‘opening round’ to three games from one, and expands regional television coverage to cable outlets TNT and TBS.
Interim NCAA president Jim Isch said in a press release, “This agreement will provide on average more than $740 million annually to our conferences and member schools to help student-athletes in 23 sports learn and compete.”
ESPN, one of the bidders for tournament rights, released a statement which said, “We made an aggressive bid and believe our combination of TV distribution, digital capabilities, season-long coverage and year-round marketing would have served the interests of the NCAA and college fans very well.”
As the new agreement will potentially change revenue distribution to member institutions, the NCAA has established a committee to evaluate new distribution formulas which will, in Isch’s words, “[support] student-athletes so they can be successful in the classroom and in life.”
