Writer says NCAA tournament expanded to 76 teams to hurt Fox Sports

A lot of sports fans are wondering why the NCAA tournament really did expand to 76 teams. It's the advertising revenue, some say. It's about job security for coaches, others say. It's about more television inventory, some say. It's about the wishes of the conference commissioners, others say.

All those reasons might contain some truth, but writer Morgan Wick makes a very compelling case for a different reason, the one that might actually be the central driving force behind expansion to 76 teams. You can -- and should -- read the article for yourself, but we'll hit some of the key points and offer our analysis:

College Basketball Crown

The College Basketball Crown is a Fox-televised made-for-TV postseason tournament. It happens to have eight teams. The NCAA Tournament expanded by eight teams, from 68 to 76. Start there... but don't end there. Morgan Wick has more to say about this specific point.

Why 76 and not 80?

One of Wick's really persuasive points is why the number was 76 and not 80 teams. Having 80 would be cleaner and neater, given that a 64-team bracket has 16 teams in four regions. An 80-team bracket means there would be four play-in teams in each of the four regions, creating a cleaner and more balanced bracket. A 76-team field means three bubble play-in games, not four. It's an odd fit with 76, a very even and smooth fit with 80.

What fits and what doesn't

Wick's point is that since 80 offers a much smoother and more even bracketing process and structure than 76, the refusal to go to 80 makes it really hard to assign any motive other than trying to kneecap Fox by taking away the eight bubble teams which would otherwise have gone to the College Basketball Crown in a 68-team field. The reality of 76 being a curious number is a very important point to make.

High majors versus mid-majors

We all agree that expansion to 76 is designed to serve the high majors, not the mid-majors. We don't like this, but we recognize what's going on. That very point underscores the reality of the NCAA wanting to take away attractive SEC and Big Ten teams from Fox's College Basketball Crown. The high-major component of all this reinforces Wick's point about the NCAA wanting to stick it to Fox and devalue the College Basketball Crown.

College Basketball Crown versus the NIT

Let's quote Wick directly on another key point of his argument: The College Basketball Crown (CBC) is eroding the NIT, which is under the NCAA umbrella:

"Both years, though, the impact of the new tournament (CBC) on the NIT has been evident and stark. In each of the last two years, only four out of 32 teams in the NIT have come from major conferences, including, oddly enough, Oklahoma State out of the Big 12 both years. Despite being entitled to two automatic bids, the SEC sent no teams to the NIT in 2025 and only one in 2026, though Auburn ended up winning the whole thing. But 2026 also saw perhaps the ultimate statement of the CBC’s triumph over the NIT: rather than going to mid-majors or the conferences that were contracted to it, the CBC’s two at-larges went to one team from the ACC and one from the SEC. The CBC had as many SEC teams as the NIT did, and they picked Oklahoma, who had beaten out Auburn as the first team out of the NCAA Tournament. After just two years, it was apparent that even for the teams that nominally should have been on the side of the NIT, the CBC had established itself as the more prestigious tournament, reducing the NIT to the status the CBI (seemingly fully killed by all this) once had: a third-tier tournament primarily for mid-majors."

How this could have been avoided

Let's quote Wick again:

"Finding a way to offer an NIL package to student-athletes participating in or at least advancing in the NIT, comparable to that earned by CBC participants, would have been a big help, though it’s not clear that it could have coaxed enough money out of sponsors and networks. But perhaps the broadcast rights themselves could have been a point of leverage. Between the first reports of the potential formation of the CBC and its official announcement, the NCAA and ESPN announced an eight-year extension of their agreement encompassing various Olympic sports championships, the women’s basketball tournament, and the NIT and its Johnny-come-lately women’s equivalent the WBIT. The deal attracted criticism for the NCAA deciding not to separate the women’s tournament rights from the rest of the package, but in retrospect, it may have been the decision not to separate the NIT that was more damaging, even if it likely wouldn’t have attracted as much revenue.

"What if the NCAA had decided, instead of trying to coax the Fox conferences not to defect to another tournament, to instead take on the supply side and effectively try to bribe Fox into not competing with the NIT by selling them the rights to it (or at least sharing with ESPN), possibly at a discount? Fox might not be interested in a tournament with a significant number of mid-majors that would bring with it higher production costs by holding the first three rounds on campus sites, so at minimum they might still lobby for changes to put more power-conference teams in the NIT, and it likely would have made the criticism over not separating the women’s tournament rights worse, but perhaps if Fox and the NCAA had found a way to work together, we wouldn’t be subjected to an NCAA tournament expansion that seemingly no one wants."

Troubling pattern

Fans didn't want this. Americans didn't want this. Yet, it happened. It's part of a larger troubling pattern of citizens wanting Item A but power brokers not giving them A, and instead giving them an unwanted Item B. One wonders when the wishes of average Americans are going to be honored and respected in anything.

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This article originally appeared on College Sports Wire: Was NCAA tournament expansion designed to kneecap Fox Sports?