NCAA to 96 teams!?!?

One of my favourite sporting events is the NCAA Division 1 Basketball Championships, otherwise known as March Madness. Recently the NCAA has gone into Madness by wanting to expand the tournament by 31 teams to 96. 96 teams. I thought I would go over a reasonable list of Pros and Cons for this:

Pros-
1. "If Less is More, just think how much more, more will be."- Frasier Crane
More is not necessarily better, just think about it like this- instead of bringing in more flavour (bad teams) into the tournament, we would get sub .500 big conference teams. I hate North Carolina, but I can be reasonable too- right now they are out of the 65 team bracket, but could be in on the 96 team bracket and they don't deserve to be a tournament team this year. If the committee would bring in more mid-major teams and allow games like that to happen, then the tournament could be good.

2. One more Weekend of Basketball-
I love College Basketball- the drama, the energy, the fun, the tournaments, the fan sections-and anything that means more, I can't disagree with.

Cons
1. Bracket can't fit on one page
This seems like a weak con to lead off, but think about it like this- if I gave you a two or three or four page bracket to fill out- would you? If I gave you a one page bracket to fill out- would you? I think 95% of people would rather fill out the one page bracket. It is easy to follow, easy to carry around, and more importantly easy to fill out.

2. Selection Sunday- First Games are Tuesday and Wednesday
That is a huge con- for one thing, it means that you have only 40 hours or so to fill out your bracket and submit it in. Although the Tuesday and Wednesday addition would be considered a Pro, I cannot take 4 days off of work to watch it, and chances are the best drama would be on the Tuesday and Wednesday. So why not have the schedule like this:
Selection Sunday
1st Round- Saturday and Sunday
2nd Round- Thursday and Friday
3rd Round- Saturday and Sunday
Regionals- Thursday-Sunday
National Finals- Saturday-Monday

Well logistics are a nightmare- first off that is 10 days without a game for 32 teams, then the teams that win on Saturday and Sunday would either have to be at the site until Thursday or Friday OR go home for a couple of days and come back. Either way costs would go up.

The Tuesday-Sunday regional plan is the most logical, but the fans could not watch 4 days of afternoon basketball, the bosses of the world would simply not allow it.

3. Big Conference- Conference Tournaments Go Down-
Granted you could argue that these tournaments don't matter now, but there are some great examples in recent history. Syracuse won 4 games in 4 days by a combined total of 9 points in 2006 to get in, Maryland in 2003 upset Duke in OT for the ACC title to get in. Georgia in 2008 won the SEC title to get in as a 12 seed and they were 16-18 on the season. Sometimes they matter, but if you expand by 31 teams, the tournaments will not matter in the Big Conferences because most of the teams will be in for the tournament. It would ruin the best week in College Basketball- Championship Week, and the best tournament of all- the ACC Tournament.

So please NCAA- keep the field at 65, in fact lower it to 64.