In recent years, the Syracuse Orange and other NCAA programs have learned to adapt as significant changes come to college sports, and one move that has circulated for months appears to be another step
closer to becoming reality.
While not official, NCAA executives are “inching closer” to expanding the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament to 76 teams, a bump from the current number of 68 teams, according to Ross Dellenger of On3.
Expansion would also mean adding eight more March Madness games, meaning instead of the usual “First Four” fans are used to seeing, there would be a 12-game “opening round” where all games will be played at two sites. Once those 12 games concludes, that will reduce the tournament bracket down to 64 teams, and the rest would play out as normal.
Additionally, Dellenger is reporting the expanded tournament could start as soon as the 26-27 season.
Part of the new format also includes an important factor to point out: how are the teams picked? According to this new reporting, the 12 “play-in games” would be the “12 lowest-seeded conference champions against the 12 lowest ranked at-large teams.”
All this comes after months (and years) of discussion and rumors concerning the expansion of the tournament, and that included all sorts of proposals, from 72 or 80 to 96 total teams. It’s also certainly a “divisive” topic with college basketball media members and plenty of others clearly being in the anti-expansion camp.
The NCAA Tournament bumped up to 64 teams in 1985. It wouldn’t be until 2011 for the next change to arrive, when the tournament added another four teams and created that iconic “First Four” Round. Including the upcoming 2025-26 season, the tournament has stayed at its 68-team number for the last 15 years.
Taking a step back into Orange Land, this obviously opens the door for a few more spots where Syracuse could sneak in to the Big Dance if it were on the bubble. At least four ACC teams have made the tournament every season this century, but the conference’s pure number of teams to make it has dropped off in recent years. In 2018 and 2019, it was as high as nine, but last season, that number dropped to four.
For 2025, ESPN’s latest bracketology update projects that six ACC teams will make it in — Duke (one-seed), Louisville (five-seed), North Carolina (six-seed), NC State (eight-seed), Virginia (Last Four In) and Miami (Last Four In) — with another two (SMU and Clemson) within First Four Out/Next Four Out territory.
The obvious elephant in the room is conferences are trying to maximize the number of teams they can get into the March spotlight, whether for branding purposes, bragging rights, a number conference leaders can point to and say “hey, look at us!”, and so on. That same bracketology updated already has a combined 25 SEC and Big Ten teams projected as making the tournament.
And there’s an obvious concern with expansion. Look no further than last year’s tournament, where Texas (who finished 19-16 overall and 6-12 in the SEC) made the First Four. So a team can win just a third of its conference games and make it in?
There’s a laundry list of other reasons why this isn’t a great idea for the sport or even the schools, but alas, it’s the direction the tournament appears to be heading in, and it will be another seismic shift that Syracuse will have to adapt to.
As for the 2025-26 season, Syracuse will be looking to make the 68-team bracket for the first time since 2020-21.
