A Proposal To Help the Mid-Majors "Get" Games Vs. the "Big Boys"

One of the great issues coming out of this year's NCAA Tournament is the inability of the so-called Mid-Majors to schedule games versus the top teams in major conferences. 

On Selection Sunday, many of us were forced to listen to Dick Vitale and Jay Bilas argue about this ad nauseum, and never come to even the slightest of agreement on the issue.

While the current Sweet 16 would support the assertion that the Mid-Majors are not "worthy" of inclusion this year, the fact is that if there are only a few in the tournament, it makes it much less likely that any could advance to the Sweet 16. 

As a USC fan, and with USC being one of those teams from a major conference that will perpetually be a bubble team it appears, I obviously am all for the BCS conferences getting most of the bids.  However, I would like to propose an idea that might level the field a bit and help the Mid-Majors "get" those games that they think they need to help their resume.

My idea is spawned from the "Bracket Buster" matchups.  However, instead of having these teams play each other, my proposal is that the NCAA writes in a new rule that states that all teams that make the Sweet 16 one year must leave an open date in their schedule on a pre-determined weekend the following year for a game that will be scheduled by the NCAA.

This open game for these 16 top teams will be a game where these teams must go on the road to a so-called Mid-Major team's gym and play them there. This way, no team can complain or back out like they often do. 

If you are in the Sweet 16, it means you are going on the road the next year to play a Mid-Major. These matchups would all fall on one weekend early in the basketball season, in a weekend in December, maybe, where football is quiet and NCAA basketball has not come to the forefront yet.

The matchups could be set as regionally as possible, with maybe Duke going to Davidson, UCLA to St. Mary's, and Maryland to George Mason, as just a few examples (not necessarily this year's matchups). 

I understand that determining which teams get the games would be difficult, but they already do this kind of arbitrary selection with the Bracket Buster games.  Whatever criterion they choose to make those matchups could also be used in this proposal.

I also know that conferences poll the coaches every year for the preseason and come up with projected finishes.  So maybe they take the top two or three teams from each conference in those preseason polls to set the games up with. 

The top teams in these conferences are the ones that need that "marquee win" on their resumes to get an at-large bid, so let's give them the chance and see what happens.

There are already so many "predetermined" matchups like the Bracket Busters, Big Ten/ACC Challenge, and Pac-10/Big 12 Challenge, that an outline for this kind of setup has already been created.

If you can imagine a weekend where many of the biggest basketball powers invade the 3,500-seat gyms of these smaller schools, then you can imagine a weekend of college basketball that is eclipsed in intrigue only by the NCAA Tournament itself.

It's a simple idea and I believe the only way to get the big conference teams to go play the Mid-Majors in their arenas is to force them to do so.

No Sweet 16 team would ever complain about having to make that trip if it was the result of being in the Sweet 16 the year before, and if the NCAA contractually obligates them to do so, then there is no debate or ability to pull out. 

Of course, the idea is not perfect, as it is certainly hard to choose the teams that get the games on their floor and often a Sweet 16 team from the year before will not be a great team the following year, but at least it would be a giant step in the right direction of bringing the conferences together and blurring the line between BCS conferences and Mid-Majors.