Porter Moser's nightmare scenario of missing the NCAA Tournament again with the Oklahoma Sooners could be over.
NCAA president Charlie Baker said during Big 12 spring meetings on Thursday that the NCAA Tournament could soon be expanded as early as 2026 for next basketball season. The expansion could go from 68 teams to 72 or 76.
"That would be the goal, to try and do this for next year," Baker said. "We've been talking about 72 and 76."
NCAA planning to expand NCAA Tournament
The NCAA Tournament last expanded from 64 teams to 68 in 2011. That expansion introduced the First Four round, which essentially created four play-in games to make the actual first round of the tournament. It was expanded to 64 teams in 1985 and drastically increased the tournament's popularity, but even more frequent expansions could do the opposite.
"If you have a tournament that's got 64 or 68 teams in it, you're going to have a bunch of teams that are probably among what most people would consider to be the best 68 or 70 teams in the country that aren't going to make the tournament, period," Baker said. "The point behind going from 68 to 72 or 76 is to basically give some of those schools that were probably among the 72, 76, 68, 64 best teams in the country a way into the tournament."
A record 14 of 16 SEC teams made the NCAA Tournament this year, including the Sooners in their first season part of the conference. The tournament berth ended a three-year drought for the Sooners and was their first appearance under Moser.
However, OU had been one of the first teams left out of the field two of those three seasons while still in the Big 12, which at the time was the toughest conference in college basketball. Had the NCAA Tournament had this new possible format, the Sooners certainly would have gotten in and 2022-23 would have been the only season under Moser that OU possibly missed out on March Madness.
If the NCAA Tournament does get expanded, that should mean at least one extra SEC team every year, so unless they finish among the bottom two or three, the Sooners should go dancing every year with a possible 76-team field. If not, it should be cause for immediate termination, and tournament success, not just getting there, would become the new measuring stick for coaching success.
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