One other new NIT choice course of introduced Tuesday by the NCAA will distribute 16 bids to “exempt” groups assembly sure standards. It marks the second 12 months in a row that standards for NIT entry has modified because the occasion seeks to solidify its place in an evolving postseason panorama.
The transfer comes amid the appearance of the School Basketball Crown, a brand new postseason event launched by Fox Sports activities that can start for the 2024-25 season. The 16-team occasion, held in Las Vegas, will award automated bids to the highest two non-NCAA Event groups from the Huge Ten, Huge 12 and Huge East. From there, the remainder of the bracket can be stuffed out by a committee.
Consequently, the NIT will now distribute a complete of 4 automated or “exempt” spots to the highest two non-NCAA Event groups from the ACC and SEC, the 2 main conferences not aligned with the School Basketball Crown. After these 4 bids are accounted for, the opposite 12 exempt groups would be the highest-ranked non-NCAA Event groups from the nation’s high 12 conferences.
The willpower on the highest 12 conferences can be made by Ken Pomeroy’s scores of the leagues. Nevertheless, figuring out who the highest groups are from these conferences can be a decidedly extra convoluted course of that includes KenPom, BPI, KPI, NET, power of document, BartTorvik.com and “wins above bubble” metrics.
All 16 exempt groups can be assured the possibility to host first-round video games. Different assured spots within the NIT can be preserved for regular-season convention champions that common 125 or higher throughout the BPI, KPI, NET, KenPom, SOR, Torvik and WAB rankings. Any remaining spots within the 32-team discipline can be stuffed on an at-large foundation by the NIT committee.
Traditionally, the NIT awarded automated bids to any regular-season convention champions who did not make the NCAA Event. Nevertheless, that modified for the 2023-24 season when the NIT introduced that its solely automated spots can be for the highest two non-NCAA Event groups from the ACC, Huge 12, Huge East, Huge Ten, Pac-12 and SEC.
That transfer was met with pushback for the way it put the squeeze on low-and mid-major packages who gained their convention’s common season title however didn’t win their convention event. Previously, these groups might sit up for the NIT as a comfort prize in the event that they missed out on an NCAA Event bid by advantage of a loss of their convention event.
The brand new choice standards for the 2024-25 NIT ought to guarantee higher entry — and extra probabilities to host video games — for low-and mid-major faculties. Nevertheless, that could be a largely unavoidable byproduct of the Fox-sponsored occasion that can be siphoning off the most-attractive groups from the Huge Ten, Huge East and Huge 12.