March Madness, the greatest event in the sports universe, is here! But for reasons scientists cannot explain, not everyone on the planet designs their March calendars around the college basketball postseason. And so as a public service I offer this simple explainer of the 2025 college hoops tournaments for the misguided souls who do not eat and sleep basketball.
There are four-and-a-half college basketball tournaments in 2025: the NCAA, the NIT, the Crown, the CBI and the CIT. Each has its own selection process and format.
1. The NCAA tournament
Known as the “Big Dance,” the NCAA tournament is by far the richest and most glamorous. It gets first dibs on 68 teams, and there is a mysterious selection committee that decides which teams will get the 37 at-large bids.
This year the committee was chaired by the Athletic Director of North Carolina, the aptly named Bubba Cunningham. And by a wild coincidence, the underperforming North Carolina Tarheels were the last at-large team selected to the NCAA tourney field! Cunningham promises that he stood in the hallway and definitely did not mouth “pick UNC” through the window while the Tarheels were discussed, so everything was just fine.
But don’t worry, there will be justice. The Governor of West Virginia called a press conference (not a joke) on Monday to demand a formal investigation into why the Tarheels were selected over the Mountaineers (also not a joke). Expect Cunningham and the committee to be arrested or at least to be asked by Elon Musk to demonstrate their value.
The NCAA tourney begins in earnest on Thursday, but eight of the least impressive teams in the field are punished for their mediocrity: they are forced to fly to Dayton to show that they deserve to play with the rest of the field. These games will appear on screens on Tuesday and Wednesday nights and will cause your aunt and annoying coworker to text you “Wait, is it too late to get my bracket in?”
2. The Crown
Historically the next-best postseason tournament was the NIT, but Fox has thrown together a new tournament for 2025 called the “College Basketball Crown.” Although it was invented 10 minutes ago, it’s already the second-best postseason tournament, mainly because Fox whispered to the conferences that it pays piles of media money (to the Big 12, Big Ten and Big East) so it would be really cool if they blew off the NIT and came to the Crown instead. So of course they mostly did.
My favorite part is that West Virginia — the school that accused the NCAA selection committee of favoritism — passed on the NIT for the Crown as a favor to its TV partner. (This was not mentioned in Monday’s press conference.)
Here’s what we know about the Crown: it has 16 teams and will be played in Las Vegas in a couple weeks. That’s pretty much it. There are just so many questions to be answered: Will the champs be given actual crowns to wear? Will the coaches be too hungover to draw up plays? Will anyone be watching when DePaul shocks the world to win the first Crown?
3. The NIT
The National Invitation Tournament has been relegated to third-best status in 2025. It has 32 teams and a TV contract with ESPN, so you’ll probably bump into it over the next few weeks.
The NIT accepted 33 teams this year, which by my math is one more than it should have taken. That was easily fixed, though, when it rescinded its invite to South Alabama in favor of UC Riverside after Riverside changed its mind and decided to come to the NIT after all. South Alabama is understandably mad — they celebrated the invite and began to look into travel plans, and then poof, their NIT invite was gone.
How South Alabama Got Invited to the NIT. And Then Promptly Uninvited.
And you wonder why the other tournaments don’t get their own Selection Shows?
(I do not know why the NIT is being so picky about this. Is UC Riverside really such an upgrade? Can you name a player who ever played at either school? In what towns are these schools even located? I mean I’d guess one is in Riverside but I’m just assuming. Maybe we can call a press conference for South Alabama next. Justice for the Jaguars!)
4. The CBI
The fourth-best tournament of 2025 is the College Basketball Invitational. It has 11 teams, is sponsored by a mattress company and is played in Daytona Beach. I do not know why they didn’t invite South Alabama after the Riverside fiasco, but I’m too exhausted to Google it.
Speaking of Google, Elon is playing Army in the first round of the CBI, and if you search “will Elon shut down Army,” you will get weird results and also possibly be placed on a no-fly list.
4.5 The CIT?
Our last tournament counts as a half-tournament: the CIT (aka the Collegeinsider.com tournament). It was invented in 2009 and had a nice run until COVID hit in 2020, annually giving overlooked teams an opportunity to play postseason games. It went on hiatus until 2024 when it rose from the ashes and crowned Norfolk State as its champ from a nine-team field. (Credit to the CIT for managing a nine-team bracket.)
The CIT was supposed to happen again in 2025 — it really seems like it tried. It still has a website and a selection committee, and there’s even a placeholder tournament schedule posted on Wikipedia. But, and this is important, it does not seem to have actually invited any teams yet. So the CIT may be dead, or at least on hiatus again.
And that leaves us with only one choice. It’s obvious, and it’s the right thing to do.
YOUR 2025 CIT CHAMPIONS: THE SOUTH ALABAMA JAGUARS.
