National Invitation Tournament Totally Explained

Everything about the National Invitation Tournament totally explained

The National Invitation Tournament (NIT) is a men's college basketball tournament operated by the National Collegiate Athletic Association. The association plays two tournaments each season. The first is played in November and is known with its sponsorship as the Dick's Sporting Goods NIT Season Tip-Off (formerly the Preseason NIT), and was founded in 1985. The second is a post-season tournament played in March and April. In both cases, its final rounds are played at Madison Square Garden in New York City, and the post-season event (called the MasterCard NIT as per sponsorship) was founded in 1938. In both common and official usage, "NIT" or "National Invitation Tournament" refers to the post-season tournament unless otherwise qualified. Both the pre- and post-season tournaments were operated by the Metropolitan Intercollegiate Basketball Association (MIBA) up until 2005, when they were purchased by the NCAA.

History

The post-season tournament pre-dates the NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship tournament by one year. Originated by the Metropolitan Basketball Writers Association in 1938, responsibility for administering the NIT was transferred two years later to local colleges, first known as the Metropolitan Intercollegiate Basketball Committee and in 1948, as the Metropolitan Intercollegiate Basketball Association (MIBA), which comprised representatives from the five New York City schools: Fordham University, Manhattan College, New York University, St. John's University and Wagner College. Of those five schools, only NYU (as of 2008) isn't a Division I school; the Violets play in Division III.
   Originally all of the men's teams qualifying for the tournament were invited to New York City and all games were played at Madison Square Garden. Earlier rounds are now played on campus sites and only the semi-final and final rounds are held at the Garden. C. M. Newton, an NCAA consultant, former basketball coach at Alabama, former University of Kentucky athletic director and executive director of USA Basketball, who is part of the NIT selection committee, has stated that he'd like to restore the quarterfinal round to the Garden were it to become feasible.
   The men's tournament originally consisted of only 6 teams, which later expanded to 8 teams in 1941, 12 teams in 1949, 14 teams in 1965, 16 teams in 1968, 24 teams in 1979, 32 teams in 1980, and 40 teams from 2002 through 2006. The tournament reverted to 32 teams for 2007.
   In the tournaments' early years, the NIT often drew the nation's best collegiate basketball teams for several reasons. First, there was limited national media coverage of college basketball, therefore playing in "The Big Apple" provided tremendous media exposure for the team and players. This allowed players hoping for a shot at the NBA an opportunity to play before scouts for the largely east coast dominated league. The media exposure also allowed coaches to recruit better basketball players.
   Second, the NCAA was originally a tournament among conference winners. Thus, the slots were filled by automatic qualifiers from little known conferences. However, many major universities such as Marquette, Notre Dame, DePaul, and Dayton didn't belong to a conference. These "at large" teams were largely not allowed to participate in the NCAA. As late as 1970, Coach Al McGuire of Marquette, the 8th-ranked team in the final AP poll of the season, spurned an NCAA bid in protest of his team's placement in the Midwest Region, where his team would have to have played games further away from home than it would if it were in the Mideast Region. The team played the NIT instead, which they won. Such an action would be a violation of NCAA rules today. One of the “traditions” Marquette hangs its hat on is the legendary McGuire one-upping the NCAA in 1970 after receiving an unfavorable regional assignment. These independent schools showcased some of the top basketball of that decade and it's certainly within the realm of possibility that the 1970 team could have won either tournament. Third, many conferences such as the SEC were segregated, and allowing teams with black players to participate in the NCAA was problematic.
   In 1950, City College of New York became the first and only school to win both the NIT and the NCAA tournaments in the same season. Beginning in the mid 1950s, however, the NCAA tournament became the premier college tournament. The NCAA began expanding the field to include more conferences. Additionally, the NCAA tournament began awarding "at-large" bids to prominent teams. It also adopted national seeding to better balance its field, while at the same time placing powerful teams near their campuses in the early rounds whenever possible. Finally, the NCAA, being a national organization operating over the course of several months, was able to use television as a marketing tool. Over the course of two decades, the NIT was relegated to its current status as a "consolation" tournament.

NCAA Takes Control

In 2005, the NCAA purchased 10 year rights to the NIT from the MIBA for $56.5 million to settle an antitrust lawsuit, which had actually come to trial and was being argued until very shortly before the settlement was announced. The MIBA alleged that compelling teams to accept invitations to the NCAA tournament even if they preferred to play in the NIT was an illegal use of the NCAA's powers, and to testify in its behalf had subpoenaed well-known NCAA critic and then-Texas Tech coach Bob Knight. (This rule was instituted after Al McGuire's aforementioned snub in 1970.) In addition, it argued that the NCAA's expansion of its tournament to 65 teams was designed specifically to bankrupt the NIT. As part of the purchase of the NIT by the NCAA, the MIBA disbanded for the ten year duration.

The Stigma of the NIT

So strong is the stigma of the post-season National Invitation Tournament as a consolation fixture that when teams with tenuous hopes of an NCAA Tournament berth lose away from home late in the season, opposing fans will taunt the players in the closing seconds with the prospect of having to play in the NIT. This is done regardless of whether the home team is headed for the NCAA Tournament or not. Irv Moss, a journalist for the Denver Post, once wrote of such a taunt to a defeated team, "The three-letter word...was far more cutting than any four-letter word they could have hollered."
Since the post-season NIT consists of teams who failed to receive a berth in the NCAA Tournament, the NIT has been humorously nicknamed the "Not Invited Tournament", "Not Important Tournament", "Nobody's Interested Tournament," or simply "Not In Tournament". It has also been seen as nothing more than a tournament to see who the "66th best team" in the country is (since there are now 65 teams in the NCAA Tournament). However, proponents of the NIT often point out that many of the NCAA Tournament participants would likely not win the NIT. And due to the fact that thirty-one of the teams earn automatic bids in the NCAA Tournament, the claim that the NIT determines the "66th best team" is spurious as many of the automatic bid NCAA Tournament teams are in fact weaker than many of the NIT Teams. David Thompson, an All-American player from N.C. State, called the NIT "a loser's tournament" in 1975. N.C. State, which had been the previous year's NCAA champion, refused to play in the tournament that year, setting something of a precedent. In succeeding years, other teams such as Oklahoma State, Louisville, Georgia Tech, and Georgetown have declined to play in the NIT when they didn't make the NCAA tournament. One such team was Maryland; after being rejected by the NCAA selection committee in 2006, head coach Gary Williams announced that 19-11 Maryland wouldn't go to the NIT, only to be told that the university had previously agreed to use Comcast Center as a venue for the NIT. The Terrapins were eliminated in the first round by the Manhattan College Jaspers. In 2008, however, Williams announced that if invited, the Terps would play, because it would serve as a chance to further develop six freshman players on his squad and to give senior forward James Gist more exposure. For other teams, however, the NIT is perceived as a step up in a program climbing from mediocrity or obscurity, and the response is more enthusiastic.
It should be noted that the NIT Season Tip-Off carries no such stigma (mainly because it serves as a pre-season tournament), and is one of many popular season-opening tournaments held every year around the country (alongside events such as the Maui Invitational and the Great Alaska Shootout).

Selection Process

In the past, NIT teams were selected in consultation with ESPN, the television home of the NIT (External Link

). The goal of the NIT was to sustain the MIBA financially. Therefore, schools selected to play in the NIT were often major conference teams with records near .500 that had large television fan bases and would likely have a respectable attendance for tournament games on their home court. The latter is one reason why New Mexico was invited virtually every year the Lobos had a winning season but failed to qualify for the NCAA tournament . Seeding considerations and home court advantage included the number of fans willing to show up to each game. In an effort to maintain some quality, a rule saying that a team must have a .500 record to qualify for the NIT was imposed. This prevented ESPN from suggesting major conference teams that finished at or very near the bottom of their conference standings but would likely garner good fan interest.
The NCAA announced a revamped selection process starting with the 2006 tournament. The main highlights are:

Teams are no longer required to have .500 or greater records to receive bids. Since this change, all teams receiving invitations for the NIT have had a record greater than .500.
Similar to the automatic bids the NCAA Tournament grants for all conference tournament champions, all teams that won regular-season conference championships but failed to earn NCAA tournament bids are guaranteed places in the NIT. Thus, more teams from the low-major conferences may qualify. (Mid-major regular season conference champions have traditionally been invited.)

In addition, the selection process has been made transparent. ESPN no longer had a hand in the selection of the teams. Instead, a committee of former NCAA head coaches, chaired by Newton, and including Gene Keady (Purdue), Dean Smith (North Carolina), Don DeVoe (Tennessee), Eddie Fogler (Wichita State), Reggie Minton (Air Force), John Powers and Carroll Williams among others, prepared a list of potential teams in advance. The seeding and balancing process is similar to that of the NCAA tournament, with the exception that higher seeded teams will always host games, unless extenuating circumstances occur. In the past, higher seeded mid-major teams would often be forced to travel to play less highly regarded major conference teams that would be likely to sell more tickets to the game .
   ESPN continues to provide television coverage of the tournament. The NIT has a 10-year, $24.1 million contract with ESPN; this compares with the 11-year, $6.2 billion TV contract with CBS for the NCAA tournament.
   These changes are intended to encourage participation by good college teams that would rather stay home than play in the NIT – to make it the "Little Dance" instead of the "loser's tournament." Newton stated, "What we want to have is a true basketball event, a real tournament, one where there's no preconceived ideas of who gets to New York. We'd love to have great crowds, but this isn't a financial consideration. We want good television coverage, but we're not going to play this thing for television and move games around." . Another consideration is that a number one-seeded team that goes to the semifinals will have three home games, which helps ticket sales.
   Beginning with the 2007 NIT tournament, the field for the NIT returned to the 32-team field used from 1980 through 2001 from 40, the number chosen since 2002, eliminating the eight "play-in" opening round where teams played to qualify for second round games against the top eight seeds. The tournament will feature four eight-team regions. The format didn't affect the NIT's automatic bid to any regular-season conference champion that doesn't make the NCAA's field of 65. Seven teams earned an NIT bid that way in 2006.
   A new attendance record for a NIT game was set at the Carrier Dome in Syracuse, NY, March 19, 2007, at the Syracuse-San Diego State game. Syracuse won the game 80-64 with the attendance total of 26,752. The old record of 23,522 was set by Kentucky in 1979.

Women's Tournaments

Since the 1970s, there has been a Women's National Invitation Tournament. It began as an eight-team tournament in Amarillo, Texas. However, this is affiliated with the NIT in name only. It wasn't connected with MIBA and wasn't purchased by the NCAA.

Men's Post-season NIT Championships

Year	Champion	Runner-up	MVP
2008	Ohio State	Massachusetts	Kosta Koufos, Ohio State
2007	West Virginia	Clemson	Frank Young, West Virginia
2006	South Carolina	Michigan	Renaldo Balkman, South Carolina
2005	South Carolina	Saint Joseph's	Carlos Powell, South Carolina
2004	Michigan	Rutgers	Daniel Horton, Michigan
2003	St. John's +	Georgetown	None +
2002	Memphis	South Carolina	Dajuan Wagner, Memphis
2001	Tulsa	Alabama	Marcus Hill, Tulsa
2000	Wake Forest	Notre Dame	Robert O'Kelley, Wake Forest
1999	California	Clemson	Sean Lampley, Cal
1998	Minnesota ^	Penn State	None ^
1997	Michigan *	Florida State	None **
1996	Nebraska	Saint Joseph's	Erick Strickland, Nebraska
1995	Virginia Tech	Marquette	Shawn Smith, Va. Tech
1994	Villanova	Vanderbilt	Doremus Bennerman, Siena
1993	Minnesota	Georgetown	Voshon Lenard, Minn.
1992	Virginia	Notre Dame	Bryant Stith, Virginia
1991	Stanford	Oklahoma	Adam Keefe, Stanford
1990	Vanderbilt	St. Louis	Scott Draud, Vanderbilt
1989	St. John's	Saint Louis	Jayson Williams St. John's
1988	Connecticut	Ohio State	Phil Gamble, UConn
1987	Southern Miss	La Salle	Randolph Keys, Southern Miss
1986	Ohio State	Wyoming	Brad Sellers, Ohio State
1985	UCLA	Indiana	Reggie Miller, UCLA
1984	Michigan	Notre Dame	Tim McCormick, Michigan
1983	Fresno State	DePaul	Ron Anderson, Fresno State
1982	Bradley	Purdue	Mitchell Anderson, Bradley
1981	Tulsa	Syracuse	Greg Stewart, Tulsa
1980	Virginia	Minnesota	Ralph Sampson, Virginia
1979	Indiana	Purdue	Butch Carter and Ray Tolbert, Indiana
1978	Texas	N.C. State	Jim Krivacs and Ron Baxter, Texas
1977	St. Bonaventure	Houston	Greg Sanders, St. Bonaventure
1976	Kentucky	UNC Charlotte	Cedric Maxwell, UNC Charlotte
1975	Princeton	Providence	Ron Lee, Oregon
1974	Purdue	Utah	Mike Sojourner, Utah
1973	Virginia Tech	Notre Dame	John Shumate, Notre Dame
1972	Maryland	Niagara	Tom McMillen, Maryland
1971	North Carolina	Georgia Tech	Bill Chamberlain, North Carolina
1970	Marquette	St. John's	Dean Meminger, Marquette
1969	Temple	Boston College	Terry Driscoll, BC
1968	Dayton	Kansas	Don May, Dayton
1967	Southern Illinois	Marquette	Walt Frazier, S. Illinois
1966	BYU	NYU	Bill Melchionni, Villanova
1965	St. John's	Villanova	Ken McIntyre, St. John's
1964	Bradley	New Mexico	Levern Tart, Bradley
1963	Providence	Canisius	Ray Flynn, Providence
1962	Dayton	St. John's	Bill Chmielewski, Dayton
1961	Providence	Saint Louis	Vin Ernst, Providence
1960	Bradley	Providence	Lenny Wilkens, Providence
1959	St. John's	Bradley	Tony Jackson, St. John's
1958	Xavier	Dayton	Hank Stein, Xavier
1957	Bradley	Memphis State	Win Wilfong, Memphis State
1956	Louisville	Dayton	Charlie Tyra, Louisville
1955	Duquesne	Dayton	Maurice Stokes, St. Francis (Pa.)
1954	Holy Cross	Duquesne	Togo Palazzi, Holy Cross
1953	Seton Hall	St. John's	Walter Dukes, Seton Hall
1952	La Salle	Dayton	Tom Gola and Norm Grekin, La Salle
1951	BYU	Dayton	Roland Minson, BYU
1950	CCNY	Bradley	Ed Warner, CCNY
1949	San Francisco	Loyola	Don Lofgran, San Francisco
1948	Saint Louis	NYU	Ed Macauley, Saint Louis
1947	Utah	Kentucky	Vern Gardner, Utah
1946	Kentucky	Rhode Island	Ernie Calverley, Rhode Island
1945	DePaul	Bowling Green	George Mikan, DePaul
1944	St. John's	DePaul	Bill Kotsores, St. John's
1943	St. John's	Toledo	Harry Boykoff, St. John's
1942	West Virginia	Western Kentucky	Rudy Baric, West Virginia
1941	LIU	Ohio	Frankie Baumholtz, Ohio
1940	Colorado	Duquesne	Bob Doll, Colorado
1939	LIU	Loyola	Bill Lloyd, St. John's
1938	Temple	Colorado	Don Shields, Temple

* Michigan won the 1997 NIT title, but later vacated the title and forfeited its entire 1996-97 schedule due to ineligible players.
** Robert Traylor of Michigan was the MVP of the 1997 tournament, but was later declared ineligible and his award vacated.
+ St. John's won the 2003 NIT title, but later vacated the title due to an ineligible player.
^ Minnesota won the 1998 NIT title, but later vacated the title and forfeited its entire 1997-98 schedule due to academic fraud.

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