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NCAA Tried to Save March Madness With 16-Team Tournament Played Over 5 Days

By Sam Dunn

NCAA VP Dan Gavitt says attempts were made to salvage the NCAA Tournament with fewer teams and venues
NCAA VP Dan Gavitt says attempts were made to salvage the NCAA Tournament with fewer teams and venues / Tom Pennington/Getty Images

The spring already feels unique for all the wrong reasons thanks to the global coronavirus pandemic, but things are going to feel way, way too real once we get into the business end of March knowing that the NCAA Tournament was supposed to happen, but couldn't.

This week, the NCAA made the tough but necessary decision to cancel all scheduled tournaments for men's and women's sports for both the winter and the spring. But that doesn't mean they didn't work right through the 11th hour to try so salvage March Madness using some truly unique proposals, reports Ralph D. Russo of the Associated Press.

According to NCAA Vice President of Men's Basketball Dan Gavitt, a number of models were suggested as alternatives to the typical 68-team field. The main one he described? A 16-team tournament held over the span of five days.

Gavitt says that discussions were held about holding this 16-teamer between March 26 and March 30 in Atlanta, and that as many as nine Division I conferences could have been represented.

"Imperfect as it may be, that was one of the only reasonable options we thought we could at least maintain some level of our tournaments," Gavitt said.

Perhaps it's for the best that this alternate format never had a chance to get rolled out. As fascinating as it might have been, it's just not March Madness if it's all over in less than the span of a full week, to say nothing of the massively reduced field. But at the very least, it's nice to know that the NCAA worked hard to try to salvage this 2019-20 basketball season right up until such a thing became impossible.