 The NCAA Tournament started back in 1939, a year after the NIT. It took 15 years, but eventually the expanded field of the NCAA Men's College Basketball Tournament trumped the NIT, a more exclusive tournament played in Madison Square Garden, and became the clear true top tournament in college basketball. The NCAA tournament has expanded a few times, beginning as an eight-team tourney, expanding to 16 teams in 1951, and upward from there. The tournament as we know it, a 65-team field with a play-in game before the office brackets start counting wins and losses, has been around since 2001. The tournament has 31 automatic qualifiers coming from conference tournaments and season standings and 34 at-large bids. Typically, the at-large bids are dominated by the power conferences (Big East, Big 12, Big Ten, ACC, SEC, Pac-10), but the so called Mid-Majors have been chipping away at that dominance since Gonzaga became a household name. Find your NCAA tickets from OnlineSeats and catch any round for cheap, whether you want to see the first two rounds to catch the best four days of college basketball of the year or the Final Four to see the last teams standing. We have a terrific selection to see your alma mater or your inherited team play.
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