The NCAA had a narrative that they wanted to employ this year in the NCAA tournament. Just like any entertainment business what most fans forget to realize is that the business is trying to push things that would garner more ratings and money. The story of Virginia on the surface was bigger than just a cinderella story of a team going from being one of the greatest collegiate disappointments in NCAA history to becoming one of the most triumphant stories a year later. Sure on paper, it sounded perfect and made sense, but that is exactly why you can feel that things are contrived.
Any time in sports business when something is too good to be true, usually it is. Virginia was the perfect story to sell for the NCAA. All of their players were 2 to 4 year players who embellished the glamour of the values of the college system. They were the exact contrary of the makeup of Duke and Kentucky. This team symbolized the importance of why young players coming from high school should come through the collegiate ranks, if you are the NCAA. You get better, you get a platform to shine, you raise your value, you gain an education and ultimately you get to achieve something a lot of others don't in contending to win a NCAA National Title.
Virginia was the selling point for the NCAA. So it was in their best interest to see them win. They had everything going for them to be picked as the staple for this agenda by the NCAA, and that is why Auburn got screwed in their game against Virginia with that missed double dribble call, and bad foul call at the end for Virginia to shoot 2 free throws to seal a victory. There use to be a thing where the players got to decide the last 10 seconds of a game and not be bailed out by foul calls. Today, even in the NBA, players are looking to be bailed out instead of just making it happen.
Auburn was on the verge of ruining the storyline and the NCAA did not want that to happen. Sometimes in sports teams can rise above what's best for ratings and can get pass all of the extracurriculars during the course of a game or series, and other times they can't. For Auburn, they came two missed calls away from beating the agenda on hand. However, if I'm the NCAA, I had to do this. The NCAA is in a war with the NBA in trying to make sure that the NCAA can maintain getting high school prospects to consider collegiate athletics before the pros.
They're losing this war on two fronts. Universities due to Calipari and now Krzyzewski is employing the use of one and done athletes. Taking the nations best prospects, compiling them on one team, for one year, for one run at a National Title, and turning them over to the NBA draft (via that athletes choice), then repeating this process. Then, the NBA is offering the opportunity for prospects who are not yet ranked great enough to be in the draft the opportunity to play in the G-League and get paid to better themselves to become a prospect for an NBA roster (not to mention overseas basketball). So what advantage is there for a top ranked high school athlete to attend college and play for free?
The NCAA response, was Virginia. The one and done teams didn't even get to the final four! Zion Williamson, came back to play because he wanted to be a part of the NCAA tourney! The top athletes on Virginia will have completed the process of what college sports is about, by obtaining degrees, winning a national title, raising their value due to the stage of the NCAA tournament and still be in position to get paid in the NBA by being viable prospects for the NBA draft! Thus making the NCAA argument of not having to pay athletes during college because we are the system that prepares you for your checks, just like college prepares their non-student athletes for their chosen professions.
However, the NCAA will have to be careful because eventually Calipari or Krzyzewski will put together a team that lacks eye-balling weaknesses. Both Kentucky and Duke this year were to glaringly deficient, so it made it easier for them to potentially lose. If it comes a time where that is not the case, it will be hard for the NCAA to sell 2nd tier prospects beating 1st tier prospects!
Comments