Could the recent shifts in TV rights and conference alignments eventually lead to the formation of an NCAA tournament competitor? It’s possible according to Jay Bilas.
The ESPN college basketball insider told Dan Patrick on Monday that conferences like the Big Ten and SEC, which are in contracts valued near or in excess of $1 billion a year, are paying attention to the dynamics at play.
“I think there is a chance in the future, and I’m not saying it’s immanent, but a chance in the future where the biggest conferences will say, ‘Well why are we letting someone else control all of this? Especially all of this money? Why don’t we just start our own tournament?'” Bilas said.
Bilas said the money some of these schools are receiving just from these massive contracts has made some conferences even bigger than the NCAA itself.
“Given how everything is changing and is going to continue to change, and we’re having all these conferences realign – and the amount of money in this multi-billion dollar business is growing,” he said. “Tournament inclusion is a big deal and having this committee decide this stuff when the criteria is a moving target I think that’s gonna be a possibility in the future.”
Patrick said ultimately as the landscape in college athletics continues to shift, the chatter about potentially breaking away from the NCAA tournament with the bigger conferences intensifies.
“You’re hearing more about it, and I don’t see it in the next few years,” Bilas said. “But we didn’t see any of this conference stuff coming and we didn’t see everything growing to this point 20 year ago. And it would be a lot easier to start that stuff now.”
