It's time to offer a little nuance to the P5/non P5 discussion just to offer some clarity on the issue. First and foremost, this tournament still offers automatic bids to I believe 31 schools who have earned the right to represent their conference, almost always by winning their conference tournament. At least up until now, there has never been any discussion about changing this. (Not saying it isn't a conceivable consideration down the road but for now, there has been zero evidence of this.) So let's be clear that no committee has ever sought to exclude any of these schools who win their conference tournaments.
Those non P5/BE schools who have had success in this year's tournament include Gonzaga, San Diego State, Furman, Florida Atlantic, Princeton, Fairleigh Dickinson, and Houston. Two footnotes: first, FDU should not have actually been in the field, but Merrimack is still ineligible as a new D1 program. And while Houston was technically an at large because they lost their conference final to Memphis, everyone knows that Houston had a ton of injury problems and was one of the best teams in the country all season long.
The others on this list all earned their right to be there and were able to capitalize. So if you would like to believe that the midmajors were blatantly ripped off insofar as not enough of them making the Dance to begin with, then it's far more instructive to look at those midmajors who did make the field as at-large teams. There weren't very many:
Nevada lost in its play-in game to Arizona State
Boise State lost to Northwestern in the first round
Utah State lost to Missouri in the first round
Houston won a few games but if we look at this like we should, that Houston should be the AQ and Memphis the at-large, Memphis lost to Florida Atlantic in the first round.
Excluding Houston, only St. Mary's pulled off a first round win over VCU before falling in the next round to UCONN.
When analyzing these results, in all objectivity, why would anyone think that the midmajors deserved more at large slots? Who would these teams be? Hofstra, after the College of Charlston lost in the first round? Dayton, after VCU lost in the first round? New Mexico, after the 3 Mountain West at large schools went winless? Nobody from the AAC, MVC, or WCC. Perhaps the singular case that could be made would be North Texas, out of Conference USA, who is still alive in the NIT (as is UAB but they really couldn't have been considered), had strong computer numbers, and was the runner-up to Florida Atlantic.
After the seemingly countless numbers of posts whining and complaining about how the little guys are disrespected and deserved more at-large bids, the summary is that:
1) Many of these teams who were automatic qualifiers made the most of their opportunities. So yes, the midmajor Automatic Qualifiers did have (and are having) an excellent tournament.
2) Because #1 took place by no means should infer that other schools from these conferences are deserving.
3) Based on the tournament's results, North Texas is literally the only non P5-BE who has a legitimate case for being upset over not having been selected.
Alum '04 wrote:
Amazing.
