Tag: NIT

Fox Sports announces new college basketball tournament to compete with NIT

Fox Sports announced the College Basketball Crown on Wednesday, a 16-team men’s college basketball tournament in Las Vegas meant to compete with the NIT.

The college basketball postseason structure could look different in 2025.

Fox Sports announced its newest creation on Wednesday, the “College Basketball Crown,” a tournament intended to compete with the NIT.

According to reports, the 16-team tournament will take place in Las Vegas and feature teams who aren’t selected for the NCAA Tournament.

The Big Ten, Big 12, and Big East will get two automatic bids for the best teams left out of March Madness. No other automatic bids will be granted, so the remaining 10 squads will be at-large teams.

The College Basketball Crown is intended to debut next spring. The tournament will begin on Monday, March 31, and go through Sunday, April 6, meaning the final game will be the day between next year’s Final Four and NCAA Tournament title game.

Fox and FS1 will broadcast games.

In recent years, more teams have passed on the NIT, the tournament intended to be the NCAA Tournament’s consolation bracket, due to the, well, consolation nature of the tournament. It remains to be seen if the lure of Vegas and Fox will be enough to convince some bigger programs to accept invitations.

If you count the NCAA Tournament, NIT, and College Basketball Crown, there are now 116 postseason spots up for grabs in men’s college basketball.

Georgia routed by Seton Hall, ending NIT run

The Georgia Bulldogs run to the NIT semifinals ended Tuesday night with a defeat to the Seton Hall Pirates.

The Georgia Bulldogs run to the National Invitational Tournament semifinals ended Tuesday night in Indianapolis in an 84-67 loss to the Seton Hall Pirates. This loss ends head coach Mike White’s second season with a final record of 20-17, a slight improvement on last season’s 16-16 finish.

The Pirates got off to a hot start, while the Bulldogs struggled to find any rhythm offensively, leading to a halftime score of 42-25 in favor of Seton Hall. The two teams would score an even 42 in the second half, but Georgia never cut the lead to fewer than 11 points.

Silas Demary Jr. was the Bulldogs leading scorer, with 19 points in addition to four assists and three rebounds. The Dawgs as a team shot only 38.5% from the field and 19.2% from three, while the Pirates managed to shoot 47.1% and 40% respectively and also outrebounded the Dawgs 45 to 32.

Seton Hall will advance to the NIT final against the Indiana State Sycamores, while Georgia will begin to prepare for the 2024-2025 season.

Georgia vs. Seton Hall basketball: TV, preview and prediction

Georgia basketball plays Seton Hall in the NIT semifinals on Tuesday

The Georgia Bulldogs (20-16, 6-12) basketball team plays Seton Hall in the semifinals of the National Invitational Tournament. Georgia faces a big test from a No. 1 seed, the Seton Hall Pirates (23-12, 13-7).

Seton Hall finished the regular season as the fourth-best team in the Big East. The Pirates are coming off a dominant 91-68 win at home over UNLV.

The NIT semifinal will be played on Tuesday, April 2 at 9:30 p.m. ET. The Georgia-Seton Hall game will be televised on ESPN2. The contest will be played at Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, Indiana, which is a neutral site. The Georgia-Seton Hall winner will face the Indiana State-Utah winner for the NIT championship.

Head coach Mike White and the Bulldogs won last week at Ohio State in their second straight NIT road victory. Georgia opened the NIT against one of Seton Hall’s Big East rivals in Xavier.

Georgia’s leading scorer is guard Noah Thomasson, who averages 13.1 points per game. Jabri Abdur-Rahim, one of Georgia’s top players, missed the Ohio State game with an ankle injury and is likely out against Seton Hall.

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Guard Kadary Richmond is Seton Hall’s leading scorer at 15.6 points per game. ESPN gives Georgia a 44% chance to defeat Seton Hall.

Prediction: Georgia 76, Seton Hall 74

At this point, we are buying into Georgia’s NIT tournament run. The Bulldogs defeated two Power Five teams on the road in back-to-back games and should have what it takes to beat the Pirates.

Georgia at Ohio State basketball: TV, preview and prediction

Georgia basketball plays Ohio State in the NIT quarterfinals on Tuesday

The Georgia Bulldogs (19-16, 6-12) basketball team plays Ohio State on the road in the quarterfinals of the National Invitational Tournament (NIT). Georgia faces a tough test from the Buckeyes (22-13, 9-11).

The quarterfinal game will be played on Tuesday, March 24 at 7:00 p.m. ET. The Georgia-Ohio State game will be televised on ESPN.

Head coach Mike White and the Bulldogs won at Wake Forest 72-66 on Sunday. Ohio State, who is a strong team at home, is coming off a 81-73 win over Virginia Tech. Ohio State is 15-4 at home this season, while Georgia is only 5-6 on the road.

Georgia knocked off Xavier, 78-76, in Athens in the first round of the NIT. Ohio State picked up a first round NIT win over Cornell.

Georgia’s leading scorer is guard Noah Thomasson, who averages 12.9 points per game. Jabri Abdur-Rahim, one of Georgia’s top players, missed the Wake Forest game with an ankle injury and is likely out against Ohio State.

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Guard Bruce Thornton is Ohio State’s leading scorer at 15.8 points per game. ESPN gives Georgia just a 21.3% chance to defeat Ohio State. Ohio State is 8.5-point favorites against Georgia according to BetMGM.

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Prediction: Ohio State 80, Georgia 72

Georgia will put up a fight, but Ohio State is a tough team to beat at home. We think Georgia’s NIT run comes to an end against the Buckeyes.

Porter Moser speaks on turning down NIT invitation

Porter Moser talks about why the Oklahoma Sooners decided to not play in the NIT tournament.

On Sunday, the Oklahoma Sooners found out they would not be getting into the [autotag]NCAA Tournament[/autotag]. Shortly after that, it was announced they would not be playing in the [autotag]NIT[/autotag] either.

Porter Moser held a press conference on Tuesday where he talked about the devastation his team felt after being snubbed from the tournament. He also said they were given 10-15 minutes to decide if they wanted to participate in the NIT.

“It never was a thought,” Moser said. “It’s absolutely not to disparage the NIT. I think a storied tournament. That’s not to say some coaches wanted to start on the portal. That’s not where we were. It wasn’t even about those two things. I will coach until the last bounce that I can possibly coach and I told my guys that. I said I would coach; I would develop, I would compete for this school until the last bounce. So nobody can confer what it is. It was an incredible raw emotion that these kids had to make a decision in 15 minutes after heart-breaking news where some of the guys will never have a chance to play in the NCAA Tournament again.”

That was particularly the case for [autotag]Rivaldo Soares[/autotag]. It was well documented how he had never made an NCAA Tournament and was using that as motivation. He was arguably playing like the Sooners’ best player at the end of the year but continued to battle an ankle injury.

Moser said he ultimately didn’t feel they’d have enough guys to field a team. Now the Sooners are back to where they were a year ago, trying to figure out how to build a team to make the NCAA Tournament while also going to a new conference.

How they respond to this will determine how good of a year they will have next season.

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Iowa Hawkeyes hosting Kansas State in first round of the NIT

The Iowa Hawkeyes will be welcoming in Kansas State as they host the Wildcats in the first round of the NIT.

The Iowa Hawkeyes still have something to play for this season. After being on the cusp of the NCAA Tournament after a strong surge down the stretch, the Hawkeyes will be a No. 3 seed in the NIT.

Iowa will be hosting the Kansas State Wildcats at Carver-Hawkeye Arena on Tuesday, March 19 at 8:00 p.m. CT in a first-round game that will be airing on ESPN. Iowa enters the postseason with an overall record of 18-14 while Kansas State carries a 19-14 record with them.

Iowa has a lot to gain from playing in the NIT this year. The Hawkeyes have a ton of potential and upside for the 2024-25 season and these extra games can kickstart the offseason on the right foot with a strong NIT showing.

The rest of Iowa’s quadrant features the Utah Utes (19-14) taking on the UC Irvine Anteaters (24-9). Other Big Ten teams to accept an invite to the NIT include the Ohio State Buckeyes, who host Cornell in the first round, and Minnesota, who travels to take on the Butler Bulldogs in the first round.

The NIT concludes April 2-4 with the semifinals and championship game taking place at Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, Indiana. With the season still alive, the Iowa Hawkeyes should relish this opportunity to get a head start on next season.

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Tom Crean nailed it with his impassioned rant against teams declining NIT invitations

“Give your players and coaches a chance to keep coaching and playing.”

In an era of college sports defined by movement in the pursuit of money — whether that’s players and coaches changing teams, teams changing conferences or conferences changing tv partners — it’s always nice to have a reminder that some people are still in it for the love of the sport.

It was hard to feel that way Sunday after seeing teams snubbed from the NCAA men’s basketball tournament decide to also opt out of the National Invitation Tournament (NIT), thus ending their seasons. Whatever their reasons, it was just another example of the sport itself not being enough reason to play, an idea that’s sadly been normalized so much that I never considered the potential benefits of a tournament that didn’t crown a national champion.

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As far as I had always been concerned, the NIT was nothing more than an acronym for “Not In Tournament,” and the teams involved were playing games that didn’t matter. Then, I heard ESPN analyst and former coach Tom Crean’s impassioned rant against the declined invitations, and he convinced me on one point.

“Give your players and coaches a chance to keep coaching and playing, and don’t short change,” Crean said. “If a guy doesn’t want to play, go sit down. If a coach doesn’t want to coach, go recruit. But there’s gotta be enough people to put five, six, seven people on the floor and go play. Makes absolutely zero sense to me.”

Give your players and coaches a chance to keep coaching and playing. That’s a powerful line, because there will come a time when those players and coaches won’t be able to play and coach again, and all they’ll have is the memories of when they could. That’s especially the case for seniors who maybe went into Selection Sunday hoping for one last game, only for their teams to never show up on the big bracket.

Of course, these declined invitations don’t all happen in a vacuum. Every team’s situation is different, and some may have had valid reasons for opting out. The transfer portal opening Monday complicates things too. And I’m not going to sit here and act like I’ll miss a bunch of teams I wasn’t going to watch anyway. But that shouldn’t be the impetus for teams wanting to play.

The NIT may not carry the same prestige as it once did, but it does provide graduates a final chance to play. It gives underclassmen another development opportunity. It gives players and coaches more exposure. It’s not completely useless. It only seems that way when teams like St. John’s, Pittsburgh and Indiana decide it’s not worth their time. And that’s unfortunate, because for a lot of the student-athletes and coaches, it may be their last time.

Oklahoma declines NIT invite, ends season

Oklahoma declines NIT offer and officially ends it’s season.

In the immediate aftermath of the selection committee’s decision to exclude Oklahoma from the 2024 NCAA Tournament, the focus immediately shifted to the Sooners next move. Would they accept an invitation to play in the NIT? Or would they decline and end their season?

The answer came in a statement from Porter Moser posted on social media:

After deliberating with the administration, the staff and the team, the Sooners declined an invitation to participate in the NIT. This decision ends Oklahoma’s up-and-down season.

Oklahoma now turns its sights on moving to the SEC next year.

Over the next few weeks, the No. 1 priority for the Sooners is assessing what players will be staying or going and figuring out a plan for constructing the roster for next year.

It seems a foregone conclusion that the Sooners will be active in the transfer portal. Hopefully, the Sooners will not have to replace seven players via the portal as they had to do last offseason.

The transfer portal opens on Monday. It’s hard to imagine the portal’s opening didn’t influence Oklahoma’s decision to pass on the NIT. The porter is a competitive time, and Oklahoma may need to focus more resources on it.

The Sooners will bring on board two high school recruits this year: four-star power forward Kuol Atak and three-star in-state combo guard Dayton Forsythe.

Game Preview: Florida gears up for NIT Season Tip-Off against Pittsburgh

The Florida Gators are traveling to Brooklyn, New York to challenge the Pittsburgh Panthers in the NIT Season Tip-off

The Florida Gators are hitting the road again to play in neutral territory on Wednesday night, as they prepare to play the Pittsburgh Panthers at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.

Florida and Pittsburgh face off for the first time since the second round of the 2014 NCAA Tournament, where the Gators struck down the Panthers, 61-45 on the way to a Final Four appearance.

Florida is riding a two-game win streak after taking down in-state nemesis Florida State, 89-68, last Friday night. Gators head coach Todd Golden told the media that he’s looking forward to the matchup with Pittsburgh.

“We’re coming up in the next couple days against a really good team that has blasted every team they’ve played,” Golden said. “I feel like we’re going to have a tough matchup Wednesday in Brooklyn. We’ll try to use that, for sure, as momentum, a little proof in concept that what we’re doing is working, but with that being said we’re going to have to have two really good days of practice before we go into Brooklyn on Wednesday.”

The Panthers annihilated Jacksonville on Friday night by a 51-point margin, 107-56, and will look to move to 5-0 on Wednesday night. Here’s how both teams will line up by tipoff.

Watch: Notre Dame gets big win over UConn in 2010

Remember this game?

Notre Dame’s season is about to begin, and it probably is going to be a rough one. So the only thing to do in this situation is look back on better times. In this case, let’s watch ESPN’s highlights of the Irish’s 58-50 victory over UConn in 2010, even though much of the clip talks about the Huskies’ NCAA Tournament bubble possibly bursting:

Indeed, the Irish’s victory in this Big East matchup was a big blow to the Huskies. More importantly, it improved the Irish’s NCAA Tournament resume, and they indeed made the Big Dance while the Huskies had to settle for the NIT.

Perhaps the most impressive thing about the game is that the Irish won it without the injured [autotag]Luke Harangody[/autotag]. Instead, [autotag]Tory Jackson[/autotag] scored all but two of his 22 points in the second half to lead the way.

Even though it’s been 10 years since the Irish left the Big East, do you still miss it? This clip definitely might make you.

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