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ACC QUESTION of WEEK : Should the NCAA selection committee release a bracket?
We’re all trying to deal with hugely important matters of self-isolation, stocking up for several weeks — maybe multiple months — of confinement. Before anything and everything else, PLEASE stay safe. Don’t go out in crowds except for absolutely essential tasks. Get lots of simple pantry food as opposed to premium steaks, fine liquor, massive desserts, and other items which qualify as luxuries more than basic necessities. Don’t get 25 rolls of toilet paper. Get what you need for a couple months; allow others to get the same.
And so on and so forth.
Now, about the matter of whether the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Committee should make a bracket for the 2020 NCAA Tournament which will never take place.
I don’t think a bracket is necessary. There is no need to have specific fan bases or coaches wondering how they would have matched up with each other. Teams could have been angry that they had a great draw, only to never get a chance to test it. Other teams could express relief that they had a bad draw but were spared from it.
My thought: Release a list of the at-large teams other than the First Four teams, in other words, the at-large teams which received “byes” from the First Four.
Since the full number of conference tournament games was never completed, we never got to see teams play their way into or out of the tournament. Therefore, the First Four — which represents the last four teams in the tournament — should be left blank and considered incomplete. Only the at-large teams which finished the truncated season above the First Four should be viewed as “definitely having made the NCAA Tournament.” Those coaches should get bonuses for making the tournament. Coaches of teams in the First Four — because their teams easily could have been displaced by conference tournament results Thursday through Sunday — should not get bonuses. It only seems reasonable to recognize the teams which CLEARLY got in, not the ones which MIGHT have gotten in.
That is where I stand. I know many will disagree.
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