SEC commissioner Greg Sankey has put college basketball on notice of his plan to increase the number of teams from power-6 conferences and decrease the number of mid and low major teams.  Since his remarks, Sankey has had to eat crow because no conference has had as poor showing as the SEC.  The SEC was gifted eight teams into the field of 68 and six out of the eight were eliminated from the tournament in the first two rounds. 

Greg Sankey remarks are concerning because it threatens the fabric of what makes the NCAA tournament one of the greatest sporting events in the United States.  Sankey’s remarks are also concerning because his actions turned college football into a regional sport and led to the demise of the PAC-12 conference.  

The PAC-12 conference stood for competition.  The conference played nine conference games with a rotating schedule that forced PAC-12 football teams to play each member of the PAC-12 conference every two years. Universities like UCLA did not schedule FBS teams until recently when UCLA scheduled HBCU’s and after Michigan pulled out of their home-and-home deal with the university.  The nine-game conference schedule cannibalized the PAC-12 keeping conference teams out of the playoffs.  

Meanwhile the SEC rigged the system to make sure that the conference was well represented in the BCS and college football playoffs. 

 The SEC has an eight-game conference schedule where SEC members wait as long as seven to eight years to visit certain teams in the conference.  The conference has refused to leave the south and rarely has played road non-conference games.  The third non-conference game is scheduled for November against FBS teams giving the conference a bye in late November.  

The league is amplified and inflated by ESPN for being a tough conference and while the conference is top heavy with teams like Alabama and Georgia, LSU, Florida, and Tennessee have not lived up to their expectations since 2019.  The bottom half of the league is unwatchable but the SEC rakes in millions, is well represented in the playoffs and is held in high regard even though it shies away from competition.  

For all it’s many flaws and self-inflected wounds, one of the greatest factors that led to the demise of the PAC-12 was its desire to compete.  The nine-game conference schedule proved too difficult for any PAC-12 team to make it through the conference season without two blemishes. The nine-game conference schedule and its attrition combined with a. competitive non-conference schedule, kept the PAC-12 out of the playoffs until last year. 

What can be said about the PAC-12 conference in football cannot be said about any power-six conference in basketball.  Power-six conferences do not stand for competition, they hide from it.  

The purpose of the non-conference schedule and the net-rankings is to develop a way to measure how a good or bad a conference is.  Conferences are measured by the games they play against each other in the non-conference schedule, but power-six basketball conference are following the Greg Sankey model of not traveling to play tough road games.  

The bar plot breaks down the percentage of non-conference games by all power 6 schools.  Most of the non-conference schedule is made up of home games.  In recent years, there has been a push for more competitive non-conference games and to meet these demands, teams are playing neutral site games against more difficult competition.  

Away games make up 10% of the non-conference schedule for basketball teams. To provide context, a college football schedule is 12 games and if a football team schedules one away game in the non-conference, the away game is .083 or 8% of the total schedule.  One away game in the non-conference out of three total non-conference football games is 33% of the non-conference schedule.  

A college basketball schedule is around 31 games which means that away non-conference games are less than 10% from the whole schedule if power-six conference schools as a whole schedule an average 10% road games in the conference schedule.  

Lagging in non-conference scheduling are away games at opponent sites.  

The reason why teams do not schedule many true road games in the non-conference schedule is because winning on the road is extremely difficult.  Out of 91 non-conference away games, power six school won 38 for a winning percentage of 41.76%.  

Neutral site games against tougher competition had a better winning percentage and most of the wins in the non-conference schedule come from scheduled home games of which power-six schools won 88.14%.  

The Benefit of Being Able to Buy Home Games

One of the biggest advantages that Power-Six schools have is their ability to buy home games.  There are mid-major schools whose athletic department has set aside a budget which helps schools buy home games but for the majority low to mid-major schools must go on the road to raise revenue to buy home games for future seasons.  

The struggle for teams in one bid conference leagues is dealing with the wear and tear of travel.  Schools whose funds are deficient must have a non-conference schedule filled with road games.  Coaches at these universities have to balance their roster and their schedule on a pendulum knowing that if they get caught with an road game heavy non-conference and a young or limited roster, they will get fired. 

There are other cases where a coach has a special team that is built to make a run in the tournament, but they must strike gold and beat a power-six school on the road because power-six schools do not travel to mid-major schools. An example of such a school in the 2023-2024 season was Indiana State. 

Indiana State played three road games in the non-conference schedule in 2023-2024.  Indiana State traveled to Alabama, Northern Illinois, and Michigan State in their non-conference schedule.  

One of the challenges with playing on the road is the foul disparity. In the visualization a positive foul disparity means that more fouls were called on Indiana State than their opponent.  Against Alabama, Indiana State had 24 personal foul calls versus 18 for Alabama.  Against Northern Illinois, Indiana State had 19 personal foul calls versus 14 for Northern Illinois. Against Michigan State, Indiana State had 22 personal foul calls versus 19.  

Indiana State had a challenging non-conference schedule. They played a blue blood basketball program in Michigan State and they played an SEC school that is in the sweet sixteen. 

Michigan State scheduled Duke, Butler, Arizona, Baylor, James Madison, Oakland, and Indiana State in the non-conference.  The Michigan State schedule is tough, and no one can argue that they did not challenge themselves.  What we see in Michigan State schedule besides the tough schedule is the lack of away games in their non-conference.  Michigan State played Duke, Arizona and Baylor on neutral sites and while Michigan State challenges itself, there are plenty of Power-Six schools that follow the same mode of stacking home games and not going on the road but their schedules are not as challenging as Michigan State.  

Indiana State scheduled three road games in their non-conference schedule.  The Big East led all conferences in 2023-2024 by scheduling close to 1.5 road games in the non-conference.  The SEC came in second followed by the BIG10, BIG12 and the PAC12. 

1.4 non-conference games out of a 31-game schedule = .045 or 4.5%.  

Power-6 conference schools in basketball are playing as many road games or less in the non-conference schedule as college football teams which play a 12-game schedule on average.  That is embarrassing and it speaks to a lack of competitive spirit in college basketball. 

The reason why we should demand for power-six schools to go on the road more in the non-conference is to foster competition.  Road games are more challenging because of the home crowds.  One of the biggest selling points that college basketball has over the NBA is the ruckus environments that fans create.  A neutral site game in November and December lacks the excitement of playing before a true home crowd.  

College basketball in November and December is not as polished as it is in February and March and schools are getting around the complexity of playing on the road by playing in neutral site games.  Universities can say that they are playing against tough competition, but the fans are being robbed and given the variance of winning records between neutral site and away games, it is tougher to play on the road than at a neutral site.  

Net Rating is the difference between offensive and defensive rating.  A positive net-rating means that a team scored more points than they allowed.  A negative net-rating means that a team gave up more points than they scored.  

The net rating is drastically different for power-six conference teams when they play away games than when they play at a neutral site. 

For a school like Indiana State the outcomes against Alabama or Michigan State may have been different if one of those games was played at home.  A win over either Alabama or Michigan State would have put Indiana State in the tournament.  Indiana State should have been in the tournament to begin with, but Indiana State is an example of how the margin of error is razor thin for non-power-six schools while Power-Six schools can finesse their way to twenty wins by playing plenty of home games and replacing true road games with neutral site games in the non-conference.  

Credit would be given to Alabama and Michigan State if they traveled to Indiana State in 2024-2025 but that is not the case.  

The Threat of Expansion

The death of the PAC-12 means that the BIG12, ACC and the BIG10 are expanding.  The expansion of these conferences means that in the future there will be no desire for teams to go on the road and play true away games.  For Universities like UCLA, USC, Stanford and Cal, the travel mileage will be greater in 2024-2025 than ever before.  The BIG10 and ACC teams that are scheduled to play at USC, Oregon, UCLA, CAL, and Stanford will be reluctant to add road games to their non-conference schedule as well.  

For low-to-mid major programs to get into the tournament, they will have to do what power-six teams are allergic of doing which is go on the road and win tough non-conference games against power-six schools.  

What is dead in college basketball is power-six schools going on the road to play against mid-major teams.  Power Six schools are not going to play UC Irvine or Stetson or Indiana State in their home court.  It should also not be surprising if the average of away games scheduled in the non-conference drops to less than one as the Power-Six is now Power-Five due to the death of the PAC12 conference.  

Greg Sankey’s desire to increase the number of Power Conference teams in the tournament and decrease the number of low and mid major teams in the tournament is financially driven.  The driving force is money and not competition.  The SEC was built up as being a strong conference in football through the model of ducking competition and this is the same model that is being followed by Power Conference schools and coaches.  

In the end, this is bad for college basketball, bad for the tournament, bad for mid and low major schools and bad for college basketball fans.  

College basketball should stand for competition.  Competition is what makes March Madness the special event that it is.  We want to see more Oakland’s fighting and competing and knocking out teams like Kentucky not less.  One way of increasing more mid and low major schools in the tournament is to demand that Power Conference schools schedule two true road games in the non-conference.  To demand that Power Conference schools play each other at their sites and not on neutral courts and to demand that Power Conference schools go on the road and play at non power conference schools.  

WILL THEY?

No.