Another postseason basketball tournament goes to the wayside, at least for now The College Basketball Invitational announced this week that it would be canceling this year’s tournament, putting its future in flux. Sure, it was often lost in the shuffle behind the NCAA Tournament and the NIT, but it was still an opportunity to extend a team's season past the conference tournament. The CBI claimed in its statement that it would be back for 2027, but given the state of college basketball right now (particularly its postseason), that's pretty hard to believe.
The College Insider Tournament folded last year, which also marked the debut of the College Basketball Crown, which leveraged contractual obligations between conferences and television networks (FOX specifically) and a new economic structure to poach several of the biggest names left out of the NCAA Tournament field. The future of the CBI is unknown, but without it this year, you wonder if it will ever be able to bounce back and compete with the new kid on the block.
Why is there not a CBI bracket this year?
It’s not 100 percent clear why the CBI made this move, but the tournament hosts, Gazelle Group, announced that this year’s tournament wouldn’t be on due to “circumstances beyond their control”. I don’t want to speculate too much, but it feels like there’s a lack of interest in the CBI compared to years past. Probably for the same reasons the CIT dissolved, the CBI is headed to obsolescence, too.
The CBI has been around since 2008, but over the last few years it's watched the quality of the field decline. It originally featured a 16-team bracket, though in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic it only reached that number once. In 2023, it dropped to 14 teams, and then 11 teams in 2024. The decline was obvious, and maybe the Gazelle Group just realized it couldn’t keep up with the rapid growth of The Crown.
College Basketball Crown has stolen the CBI's place in the postseason
Who doesn’t like college basketball in Las Vegas? If we’re being honest, the College Basketball Crown was a great concept: a quick, four-day tournament played entirely in Sin City. It’s almost like a bowl game feel for college basketball, if you will. And the benefits are even better, which is probably why it was already starting to surpass the CBI in year one.
To compete in the CBI, teams have to actually pay an entry fee. When it comes to the College Basketball Crown, though, the players get paid NIL money based on how far their teams advance. So not only do you get to play postseason basketball in an attractive location, but you have more reason to try because the better you do, the more you get paid.
If this is what it takes to succeed outside the NCAA Tournament and the NIT, the Crown figured it out. On top of that, the Crown is broadcast on FOX and FOX Sports, giving you a chance to get some real exposure leading up to Final Four weekend.
Will the CBI return in 2027?
It’s hard to think the CBI will return in 2027 if it can’t figure out a way to match the Crown. And when you take into account how popular The Crown will get thanks to solidifying itself as the third option, the CBI probably won’t be able to catch up. I’d like to think the Crown will soon grow to more than just 16 teams, too. The CBI has run its course, and it won’t be able to come back with the same reputation it once had.
The good thing about the new CBI is that it became a mid-major tournament, featuring fewer power conference schools with mediocre records and more deserving smaller teams that were overlooked by the NCAA Tournament's selection committee. But now that The Crown offers merit-based NIL payments, it’s easy to see how lower-tier power conference teams would be interested to play in it and spurn the NIT.
If the CBI rebranded as “Mid-Major Madness”, I think it could come back and run alongside The Crown. But it’s just hard to think that it will be able to recover after taking this season off. After all, it didn’t really recover the only other time its postseason tournament was cancelled, due to the COVID-19 pandemic.