FDU’S upset shows March Madness is perfect
Don't even think about it, NCAA. Take those plans that would ruin the glorious chaos that is the NCAA Tournament and stick them in a drawer, tear them up or light them on fire – it really doesn't matter so long as they never again see the light of day. The 64-team tournament does not need to be expanded, tweaked or altered in any way.
As we saw Friday night, it is perfect exactly how it is.
For only the second time since the men's field expanded to 64 teams in 1985, so almost 40 years now, a 16-seed took down a No. 1. And it was magical.
Fairleigh Dickinson is a small, private school in New Jersey that had never won an NCAA Tournament game before and only got in on a technicality this year. It has the smallest lineup of the 64 teams in the tournament. Yet the Knights managed to topple Purdue, a team with an elite pedigree and Zach Edey, the 7-foot-4 center who is the presumptive player of the year.
Whether you are a longtime Fairleigh Dickinson fan or had to ask Google what FDU stood for, you cannot help but be delighted with the Knights' win. Well, unless you're a Purdue fan. But even they'll come to grudgingly appreciate the enormity of what Fairleigh Dickinson did once the sting wears off.
“What a night. Incredible win for us. Incredible win for our program, our school,” FDU coach Tobin Anderson said. “Hard to put it in words right now. Honestly, it's really hard to even -- it just happened, right?”
That giddy disbelief is what makes March Madness special, setting it apart from every other sporting event.
The NCAA Tournament is one of the few things left in life where anything really is possible. Maybe not likely, but possible. You can have a roster full of blue chippers or one that resembles a rec league team and, on paper at least, on that particular day, either team can
win. You can come in with one loss or 15, and how far you go is as much about desire and catching some breaks as it is talent and reputation.
It's that hope of doing the impossible, or watching as it happens, that keeps us tuning in game after game, year after year.
“I'm shocked right now,” said Sean Moore, who led FDU with 19 points and did it in his hometown of Columbus, Ohio. “I can't believe it. It's crazy. But it feels amazing.”
That will be lost if the NCAA goes ahead with a proposal from the transformation committee – the name alone should disqualify any of its recommendations – that would expand the men's and women's tournaments to around 90 teams. It's not guaranteed the NCAA'S basketball committees will accept it and, even if they did, it wouldn't happen
until 2025 at the earliest.
But still. There is no reason to mess with what works, especially when doing so would only make it worse.
Expanding the tournaments, especially by two dozen-plus teams, would dilute them. Mediocre teams from the larger conferences would be the biggest beneficiary of an expanded tournament, and their presence would drain the tournament of its meaning. We want to celebrate upsets, not mediocrity.
The contrarians and economic opportunists – when SEC commissioner Greg Sankey is pushing something, be suspicious – will say this is no different than the arguments against expansion in the early 1980s. But the circumstances then were completely different. Entire conferences were left out of the tournament, and deserving teams were routinely passed over.
The formula now is ideal, especially since the selection committee began giving more serious consideration to mid-majors. Every conference, from the mighty ACC to the humble SWAC, is represented, along with the best at-large teams.
There are still arguments about teams that didn't get in – yes, Vanderbilt, we know – but it's a handful of teams rather than the dozens it once was. And isn't arguing about those few snubs better than having sub-.500 teams from the Power Five conferences taking up space?
If pretty much everyone can make it into the tournament, it's no longer special. And then those wins by the little guys won't be, either.
March Madness is one of the few things we all love and can agree on. Please don't wreck it, NCAA.