March Madness is the NCAA men’s and women’s basketball tournament. This is one of the best events in American sports. Each spring, millions of fans tune in to watch college basketball teams compete in a high stake single elimination tournament. But how did it grow into one of the best basketball events today?
The NCAA stands for National Collegiate Athletic Association. The men’s tournament began in 1939 the idea for the tournament came from Harold Oslen, the head coach at Ohio State University who proposed a march madness to know who is the best college basketball team in the world. The NCAA approved the idea that he had and the first tournament was just eight teams. The University of Oregon won the championship and defeated Ohio State in the finals.
At the time, the NCAA Tournament was not the biggest college basketball event. But over the years, the NCAA Tournament got more known especially after expanding its field and improving its organization.
Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, the NCAA tournament continued to grow and by 1951 the tournament expanded to 16 teams and in 1952 it reached 22 teams. As they added more teams the tournament got more exciting. By the 1960s, the tournament got more known and was better than the NIT with the popularity.
Then there was a major turning point in 1972 when the tournament expanded to 32 teams allowing more schools to compete. Then in 1979 the championship game between Michigan State led by Magic Johnson and Indiana State led by Larry Bird, that game became the most exciting game in college basketball at that time. This game, which remains one of the highest rated basketball ever. This helped bring national attention to the NCAA tournament.
By 1985 the tournament expanded to 64 teams creating the format that most fans remember till this day. Then a show named the Selection Sunday show came along announcing the teams, where teams are announced and seeded added even more excitement.
The term March madness actually started in 1939, the same year the NCAA tournament got accepted. It was first used by Henry V. Porter, a high school official in Illinois to describe the state’s high school basketball tournament. But it wasn’t widely accepted with the NCAA tournament until the 1980s, when CBS popularized it during its coverage of the games.
Today March madness is a massive event it’s now at 68 teams. In the men’s tournament and 68 teams and in the women’s tournament as well. It has multiple round like the First Four, Round of 64. Round of 32, Sweet 16, Elite Eight, Final Four and then the Championship Game. Millions of fans fill out brackets, hoping to predict the winner.
The tournament has also created legendary moments, form buzzer beaters to heartbreaks like Villanova upset of Georgetown or like when UMBC’s 2018 win over Virginia as a Number 16 seed and Loyola Chicago’s Final Four run in 2018.
What started as a small thing with an eight team event in 1939 has become one of the most known events in basketball . March Madness has a lot of history and drama and shocking moments, making it a famous event of American sports culture. Whether you’re a die hard college basketball fan or just enjoy filling out brackets, the excitement of March Madness continues to captivate audiences year after year.
Information derived from: Britannica’s March Madness page written by Adam Augustyn
