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| File photo by Dave Hilbert, d3photography.com |
By Pat Coleman
and Dave McHugh,
D3sports.com
All of the planning and possibilities being discussed for the 2021 Division III basketball NCAA Tournament is contingent on what the Division III management council signed off on back in September. That plan states that 60% of Division III basketball programs have to be participating at a certain level this season and by a certain date in order to hold the NCAA Tournament.
However, the numbers show right now that at best, Division III is going to fall just below that threshold. And in the end, the numbers might be much worse.
Entering Monday, Jan. 18, 65 men’s teams and 57 women’s teams have participated in at least one regular season game, as the season gets off to a slow start because of the pandemic. But according to research and interviews conducted by Dave McHugh, about 50% of schools have either opted out of the Division III basketball season, or play in conferences which are scheduling their basketball games so late in the winter as to render them ineligible for the tournament.
Everything that has been said so far points to some flexibility as to whether teams have to make it all the way to the stated nine-game minimum standard for NCAA Tournament consideration. But nobody in a position to make a decision has suggested that there is any flexibility in the date.
Selection Sunday is March 6.
Let’s dive into the numbers:
By our count there are 431 women’s basketball programs at schools which are full members of NCAA Division III, and 416 men’s programs.
Of these schools, 25 are in conferences in which winter sports were called off for the conference as a whole: the CUNYAC, MASCAC and SUNYAC. All are public school conferences where the schools were given no autonomy to create schedules on their own and those 25 are out.
Another 85 men’s programs and 93 women’s programs schools have decided to opt out on their own. These schools are across a range of conferences, some of which are playing, some of which are not, and some of which have announced plans to start play at a time which would make them unable to complete play by March 6. That includes the America East Conference, the Empire 8, the MAC Commonwealth and MAC Freedom, and the SLIAC. That covers a total of 43 schools.
In addition, there are a large number of schools who have not announced plans, but for whom we can determine that they, too, will not likely be eligible by March 6. We can do that by looking school by school to see when each of the remaining schools is bringing students back to campus. Doing that elicited another 46 men’s and women’s programs who don’t appear to have enough time to play nine games, or attempt to do so, before March 6.
We also know nothing from the Commonwealth Coast Conference, which is the only league in Division III to not announce plans for its winter sports.
By the time you get here, and add in a couple other miscellaneous schools, you reach 204 men’s programs and 214 women’s programs who, according to our research, will not be fielding a team to compete in the NCAA Tournament this year.
In both instances, that leaves us short of the 60% necessary on March 6. This would be 51.0% of men’s programs and 50.3% of women’s teams.
So, why hasn’t the tournament been called off yet?
First of all, the NCAA isn’t aware of this data yet except for hearing it from us. Dave McHugh has been tracking it and tracking down information from schools individually, but the NCAA is relying on surveys sent to schools and those have not been completed as of yet.
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| One team driving hard with hopes of their being an NCAA Tournament at the end is the East Texas Baptist women's basketball team, which is off to a 12-0 start. ETBU athletics photo |
Secondly, the Division III championships committee could change the standard to make it easier to meet. A standard created in September, based on information available four months ago, might well be worth reconsidering here in mid-January.
Let’s say we had 212 men’s basketball programs participating, as the math suggests we could. An NCAA Division III tournament bracket under normal circumstances for a sport with 212 participating schools would be 32 teams – a highly reasonable number, given the circumstances.
“The idea that we’re going to do a 48-team tournament, with six teams at eight sites feels unlikely,” Wheaton (Ill.) coach Mike Schauer, the committee chair for men’s basketball, told Ryan Scott for the Around the Nation column which was published this morning. It would be significantly easier logistically to put on a 32-team bracket, and Division III basketball may well have the numbers to support it.
And in addition, the championships committee could change the date of Selection Sunday. Back in September, it was determined to move it back a week. Moving it back a couple more weeks and keeping the tournament a two-week affair would seemingly make it possible for more schools and conferences to participate. The MAC conferences, not starting until Feb. 12, could well add 13 schools to our total if given an extra week or two. (Four schools in the MACs have opted out of basketball even on the changed schedule.)
Changing the date of selections, and thus the date of the tournaments, is indeed a significant undertaking, and it affects where the games can be played because dates for venues were set multiple years ago. In addition, the NCAA is already short-staffed because of budgetary concerns, and moving dates will require legwork both at the time of the change and at the championship itself.
“I believe that if our players want to play and we can make it safe for them and our community to do so, we should try, with the support of our great administration,” said Christopher Newport men’s basketball coach John Krikorian. “Part of that experience is competing for a national championship if one is offered.”
Schools are currently making an effort to play. Ohio Wesleyan, for example, recently announced a 10-game men’s basketball schedule and an eight-game women’s basketball schedule comprised of six schools in the North Coast Athletic Conference who plan to play, even though the conference itself called off its conference schedule and will not recognize a champion for 2020-21. These are not the only schools who indicated to us that they would make the effort to play nine games if there is a tournament.
On the other hand, if the NCAA calls off the Division III basketball tournaments altogether, it seems likely you’ll see a number of conferences or schools slam on the brakes, take their names out of the race for nine games and slow the season to a crawl.
There is still a path to an NCAA Tournament in 2021. However, it will require both the schools and the NCAA taking the necessary steps to keep it alive.