Month: March 2018

Every year, when the calendar flips to March, college basketball fans everywhere feel the excitement that can only come with March Madness. The brackets are set on the first sunday of March, selection Sunday, and up until thursday of the following week, all across the country, people who love basketball, and even those who just join their office pools for fun fill out their brackets. Some, more avid fans, try to pick the winners based on who has a better defense, while those who are just involved for the fun of it pick based on who has a better mascot. This is all fun. But how is the bracket determined, and is it fair? The bracket is determined by a selection committee of 12 men and women from various universities. They select the teams to compete in the tournament based on many criteria, mainly, RPI, strength of schedule, quality wins, and overall record to name a few. 32 teams get an automatic bid by winning their conference, and the other 34 receive at large bids. Every year there is considerable controversy over which teams get in, and, among the teams that got into to tournament, how they were seeded. There is an inherent bias shown toward teams from non traditional power five conferences. This bias is shown through the poor seeding they receive and from their usual exclusion from the tournament as a whole. Everyone loves a Cinderella team, but almost all of the Cinderella teams have something in common, they are from a non power conference.

Thesis: There is an inherent bias shown toward teams from non traditional power five conferences. This bias is shown through the poor seeding they receive and from their usual exclusion from the tournament as a whole.

Audience: Any college basketball fan that has ever felt slighted by the committee and fans of power five schools that always reap the benefits.

Outline:

First Point:

Evaluate the committee themselves. Every year they release their reasoning for who got in and why, as well as evaluate who the committee actually is.

Second Point: Discuss teams that have gotten snubbed.

a. Evaluate the criterium, “RPI”

b. Discuss how RPI is misleading and gives teams from worse off conferences no chance.

c. Evaluate how the teams that get the advantage have done in the tournament with the chance they have been given.

Third Point:

 

Bias shown through seedings. Disscuss Cinderella teams that have exposed bias by beating teams after being under seeded through case examples.

a. Wichita State

b. VCU

c. Butler

Sources: https://wtop.com/sports-columns/2018/03/ncaa-selection-committee-exposes-its-own-hypocrisy-once-again/

https://www.cbssports.com/college-basketball/news/six-seeds-the-ncaa-tournament-committee-got-wrong-wichita-state-got-jobbed/

My group did Greek life, yea we had the best title I know. Personally, I found the deliberation was fun, but restrained. A debate would have been more engaging. I understand that a debate leaves room for things to possibly get out of hand, but I would have liked to be able to engage the crowd more. I felt as the people leading the deliberation, the whole set up was too passive. We could not take sides, which is fair, but in a deliberation where I individually am biased since I partake in Greek life, I felt if I tried to help guide the conversation I would be called out as biased.

Secondly, I felt that it was hard to truly inform those in the crowd that had no background knowledge on the subject. Yes we provided everyone with an issue guide, but that was the facts and guide to our discussion. There are certain nuances that someone outside of Greek life would not understand, as well as misconceptions that those in the crowd held that if I were to engage them and try and correct them, the deliberation would lose its flow and we may digress into a debate.

Overall, I enjoyed the experience and really the ambiance of the little cafe. It is nice to hear how much some kids do not like the organization you are part of. And of course I never get tired of one kid making an analogy of how a team looks after their teammates because that is exactly the response I was looking for when I asked a question about apartment parties. Sarcasm aside, I did enjoy giving the deliberation and hearing different opinions in a public setting. It made me feel professional and stuff. Its one thing to give a debate in class, but it a public setting it seems more real.