RacerJoeD wrote:You guys are missing something. It isn’t only about bids. It’s about seeding. The swag gets a bid, but it is usually a 16. If your conference, by virtue of being perceived as a better conference and therefor the winner as a better team, gets a better seed, there is more chance of a favorable matchup in the tournament. The money in the tournament isn’t in bids, it’s in wins, because the money goes up with every round. The chances of winning go up with the better seed, and therefore the money goes up with the perception of the conference. Adding highly respected and nationally competitive teams to your conference, done correctly, makes more money per school despite the need to divide by more teams.
In a perfect world you could get more money per team. I highly doubt the committee is gonna say ISUR should have been in last year if Murray or NKU had been in the league. I highly doubt WSU would have been seeded higher. I know the shares would have been less valuable with more teams to split it between.