By Daily Mail (U.S.) | Created at 2025-03-09 21:26:26 | Updated at 2025-03-10 02:58:41
5 hours ago
If you're not one of the top college basketball teams in the country, you usually need to win your conference's basketball championship tournament to qualify for March Madness. One team has already bypassed that requirement.
Of all of the teams in the field of 68 schools that make the NCAA Tournament, 37 are 'at large' bids while 31 are conference champions which automatically make the bracket.
But one school - the University of Nebraska at Omaha - is neither a good enough at-large team nor a conference champion (well, yet). Still, they will be heading to 'the Big Dance' anyway.
The Omaha Mavericks are set to play in the championship game for their conference - the Summit League - on Sunday night.
But their opponents - the University of St. Thomas from Minnesota - aren't eligible to make March Madness just yet.
The 'Tommies', as St. Thomas' athletics teams are known, are in their final year of transitioning from being a Division II program to a Division I program.
The Omaha Mavericks are making the NCAA Tournament despite not yet winning their league
Omaha has reached the Summit League championship game. Their opponent, St. Thomas, has not yet finished a transition period and is ineligible for March Madness. Therefore, by default, Omaha's basketball team is going to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in their history.
Omaha Mavericks basketball coach Chris Crutchfield watches on during a game in 2023
According to NCAA rules, teams being promoted to D-I must wait out a transition period of four years before being eligible to make March Madness - even if said team wins their conference tournament.
Therefore, by virtue of reaching the Summit League championship game, Omaha will automatically be in the NCAA Tournament regardless of if they win or lose to St. Thomas.
It's the first time in the history of the Omaha basketball program that they will be playing in March Madness.
This is not the first time, or the most notable instance, of this rule being enacted in recent years.
Back in 2023, Merrimack College won the Northeast Conference championship game in their final year of transitioning to Division I. Due to these rules, they could not make the NCAA Tournament and the team that finished runner-up took their place. That team was Fairleigh Dickinson.
Despite losing their conference tournament, the Knights of FDU found out that they'd be a 16-seed and would play No. 1 seeded Purdue. A few days later, FDU became the third 16-seed in the history of March Madness to knock off a one-seed.
FDU joined the 2018 UMBC men's basketball team and the 1998 Harvard women's basketball team as the only three schools to pull off the 16-1 upset in the history of the NCAA basketball tournament.
The full reveal of the 2025 March Madness bracket - a day known as 'Selection Sunday' - takes place in one week.
