I mean we do the same thing (esentially) at the high school level. Different levels but you are still a State Champion.
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I hope they never do this. The NCAA tournament is still about those Cinderella's who make a run. It's still about Jimmy and his One Shining Moment, Massimino and his upset, Butler almost rewriting Hoosiers, St. Peters, Farleigh-Dickinson, and so many more moments. Hell our Final 4 Run is a direct result of one of those moments when Pete Carrill and Princeton knocked off UCLA.
People will stop caring when it's 13-17 LSU playing 27-2 Houston just because they are big schools.
Unless you have a very good young team that you know that all are coming back( few teams know), the NIT means very little in this Portal/NIL world. Very few fans care about making it now and see it as a failure. I have also read it is a $ loser, even if you get a home game or two.
Beard really needed to focus his energy on putting together another preseason hyped team that fails to make the tournament.
If I were one of the probably 3,000 fans who would?ve attended the NIT game at the Pavilion, I?d be PISSED that they didn?t play. Especially the season ticket holders who have been attending all yr. Not fair to the fans at all.
With the portal, NIL and the way rosters turnover now I understand not wanting to participate. I don’t really fault the schools if they decide not to play in it and if they do that is fine too. I think each coach should make the decision based on what he sees more valuable for the upcoming year.