The Benefits Of College Basketball
Since the N.C.A.A. men’s basketball tournament expanded to its 64-team bracket in 1985, The Associated Press poll’s preseason No. 1 has gone on to make the Final Four half the time.
This is quietly remarkable. College basketball is a notoriously fickle sport. Rosters turn over rapidly, and even the most experienced players have only three seasons under their belts. Home-field advantage plays an outsize role, making every team a citizen of Upset City. Injuries are a consideration, as is bad luck. And if all of these factors are not enough to distort preseason expectations, the tournament itself is known for unpredictable swings of fortune that by no means guarantee that the best team is left standing.
That an annual conclave of sportswriters
has this strong a record of preseason prognostication, then, reveals a fact about the nature of college basketball, which is unlikely to change even if the rules of the game are altered by the N.C.A.A. commission created in response to the federal corruption charges in September involving several programs. And that is: Although good coaching, strong conferences and the bounces of the ball all play a role in the trajectory of a season, ultimately talent tends to win out.
“You’d rather have a blend of young supertalent and talented experience,” the ESPN commentator Jay Bilas said, referring to blazingly gifted underclassmen and more seasoned, and perhaps more tempered, juniors and seniors.
This is quietly remarkable. College basketball is a notoriously fickle sport. Rosters turn over rapidly, and even the most experienced players have only three seasons under their belts. Home-field advantage plays an outsize role, making every team a citizen of Upset City. Injuries are a consideration, as is bad luck. And if all of these factors are not enough to distort preseason expectations, the tournament itself is known for unpredictable swings of fortune that by no means guarantee that the best team is left standing.
That an annual conclave of sportswriters
has this strong a record of preseason prognostication, then, reveals a fact about the nature of college basketball, which is unlikely to change even if the rules of the game are altered by the N.C.A.A. commission created in response to the federal corruption charges in September involving several programs. And that is: Although good coaching, strong conferences and the bounces of the ball all play a role in the trajectory of a season, ultimately talent tends to win out.
“You’d rather have a blend of young supertalent and talented experience,” the ESPN commentator Jay Bilas said, referring to blazingly gifted underclassmen and more seasoned, and perhaps more tempered, juniors and seniors.