We never talked about Bob Huggins’s suggestion from last week that the power conferences create their own, NCAA-less, postseason tournament. There was plenty of backlash, but it’s not unfathomable in the mid-term future. Conferences are gaining power. The NCAA is losing power. What we see in football could soon become the norm for all moneymaking sports. But, of course, they’d need to name the tournament something. So, might we suggest…the NIT?
There’s the complication of trademark law. The NCAA owns the NIT trademarks. But do those extend to all postseason college basketball tournaments with that acronym? Or do they just cover the “National Invitation Tournament”? Because if it’s the latter, National Invitational Tournament is sitting right there, and if it’s the former, well, you could always just buy the damn things.
Other matters would need to be determined, chief among them whether the tournament would keep its relationship with Madison Square Garden, second-chief among them whether any little guys would get in. But we’re a long way from that. In the meantime, we just need to keep planting the seeds. So the next time you see a college basketball power broker, try to make a little small talk with ‘em. Bring up Huggy Bear. Tell them you know this tournament might not happen right now. But if it does, down the line…you wouldn’t mind. You wouldn’t mind it happening. Provided, of course, it’s named the NIT.
