Conference Success in Earning NCAA Tournament Bids
Earlier this week, I put out an article about the distinction between major, mid-major, and low-major conferences that had a chart very similar to the below. I have expanded such to add the Power Six conferences for comparison purposes and added the column to the far right on percentage of schools in each conference that earn NCAAT bids per year.
| Conference | 2021 Bids | 2019 Bids | 2018 Bids | 2017 Bids | 2016 Bids | Avg # of Bids | # of Conf Teams* | Multiplier | Expected Bids in a 16 Team Conf | % of Teams With Bids Per Year |
| Big 12 | 7 | 6 | 7 | 6 | 7 | 6.6 | 10.0 | 1.60 | 10.56 | 66% |
| ACC | 7 | 7 | 9 | 9 | 7 | 7.8 | 14.0 | 1.14 | 8.91 | 56% |
| Big East | 4 | 4 | 6 | 7 | 5 | 5.2 | 10.2 | 1.57 | 8.16 | 51% |
| Big Ten | 9 | 8 | 4 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 14.0 | 1.14 | 8.00 | 50% |
| SEC | 6 | 7 | 8 | 5 | 3 | 5.8 | 14.0 | 1.14 | 6.63 | 41% |
| Pac-12 | 5 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 7 | 4.4 | 12.0 | 1.33 | 5.87 | 37% |
| American | 2 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 4 | 3 | 11.4 | 1.40 | 4.21 | 26% |
| Atlantic 10 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2.6 | 14.0 | 1.14 | 2.97 | 19% |
| WCC | 2 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1.6 | 10.0 | 1.60 | 2.56 | 16% |
| MWC | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1.6 | 11.0 | 1.45 | 2.33 | 15% |
| MVC | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1.4 | 10.0 | 1.60 | 2.24 | 14% |
* You may notice that some of these conferences are listed as having a number of teams that is not a whole number. And you might be thinking how can that be? (Or you’re thinking that I am a total moron). Well, friend, I have adjusted the number of teams for schools departing and joining conferences. Namely, UConn moving from the AAC to the Big East for 2020 and Wichita State leaving the MVC for the AAC in 2018 (Moves that have been widely applauded by both fan bases but some are still somewhat skeptical). Anyway, each year of having an additional team is worth an +.2 to the number of teams in a conference. This number is then used to calculate the three right hand columns.