Trivia du Jour

[Bill Marsh]

What happened is the corporate word took over and college hoops transitioned from an extra curricular activity to a big business. The Big East is really what got the whole thing started with that original ESPN contract. We dominated that period, but also showed the rest of the country how much money was in college hoops. As a result, big state schools started pouring millions of dollars of state funding that catholic schools don't have into their programs, then the NCAA Tournament expanded to 64 teams, and college basketball became what it is today- run by the TV networks, corporate sponsors, and the greed of the NCAA.

Fortunately, so many state schools now pushing basketball aside for the sport they see even more corporate $$ in (football), perhaps the catholic schools have an opportunity to push their way back into the basketball spotlight.

Hall 2012, I think you make a great point.

Just focusing on the Northeast, there wasn't much difference in the number of Final Four slots for the region in the last 25 years vs the previous 25 years, but the big difference was in who they went to. In the last 25 years, 9 Final Fours were achieved by 4 state universities (UConn 5, Maryland 2, UMass 1, West Virginia 1). In addition, Temple, another big state university went to 5 Elite 8's and with a few breaks could easily have added to that total. In the previous 25 years, Rutgers 1976 appearance was the only Final Four for a state university in the Northeast and no one else got close. The power in the region was overwhelmingly with the Big East privates (Georgetown 3, Villanova 2, Syracuse 2, Providence 2, etc). The power in the region clearly shifted.

So, what do we do to reverse the trend or do we accept our fate as the Ivies have?