March madness may soon be even bigger if Charlie Baker has its own way.
Speaking on Thursday during the Big 12 Spring meetings, the NCAA president said that he sees the value in expanding the NCAA tournament for 76 potential teams with the expectation of taking a decision on the matter on the case in the next few months.
“We have had a good conversation with CBS and WBD (Warner Brothers Discover),” Baker said. “Our goal here is to try to achieve either yes or some time in the next few months because there are many logistics work that will be associated with doing so.
“If we go down this road, you only think about the early weekends, which have to travel the longest, it becomes complicated.”
The expansion of the tournament ground increased to 68 from 65 teams in 2011, which led to the first four rounds, which two lowest seed AT-big teams against each other as well as two lowest seed conference conferences to give the champion into the pit to give a chance to reach the traditional 64-team brackets.
Baker said that he has discussed growing the ground for 72 or 76 teams.
As the Chairman of the NCAA said, there are flaws in the current format, given that even with 68 teams in the field, there are still some who believe that their teams were taken away.
“The talk behind going from 68 to 72 or 76,” said Baker, “Originally gives some of the schools that were probably one of the 72, 76, 68, 64 best teams, which is a way in the tournament.”
Census coach Bill Self said that Big 12 coaches are in favor of expansion of coach expansion. His conference showed seven tournaments entry in 2025, while compared to 14 pride by SEC.
“There was a little bit that was brought forward and the consensus between coaches, even if it was very low, would be in its favor,” Self said. “I don’t know if you can make it, where it was perfectly similar for everyone for everyone. Certainly, every situation is going to be outlair.”
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