As March Madness continues its Sweet 16, the NCAA’s other men’s postseason basketball event will hold its title game Sunday in Texas.
Though it’s nowhere near the commercial entity of March Madness, the National Invitation Tournament, or NIT, is a very profitable business for the NCAA. In 2019, the last year the event was held, it turned a $2.1 million profit on $3.3 million in expenses, according to financial documents. In 2018, the numbers were similar.
As a comparison, the 2019 women’s NCAA basketball tournament ran a $2.8 million deficit on $14.5 million in expenses.
The NIT was even more profitable last year amid the pandemic. Though the NCAA’s media payments from CBS and Turner fell from $827 million to $113 million when it canceled March Madness, its ESPN contract, which covers a host of events including the NIT, was paid in full. With an intact TV allotment and almost no expenses, the NCAA’s NIT division turned a profit of $3.7 million.
The NCAA has a complex way of rewarding teams for participating in March Madness. For the NIT, it’s much simpler. In addition to having travel, hotel and other expenses comped, each school in the NIT is given $4,000 for every game it plays. It’s a total payout pool of $128,000 this year.
The NIT, which dates back to 1938, was once the nation’s premier postseason college basketball tournament, but it was gradually overshadowed by March Madness. It has become a tournament for good teams not invited to the NCAA tournament, and in 2005 amid an antitrust lawsuit filed by the tournament owners, the NCAA agreed to purchase the NIT and its preseason sister tournament for $56.5 million.
In non-pandemic years, it is a 32-team tournament hosted on campuses in the early rounds, with the semifinals and finals played in New York’s Madison Square Garden. This year, the NCAA brought 16 teams down to the Dallas suburbs for a COVID-19 bubble. Mississippi State plays Memphis at 12 p.m. ET in the final on Sunday.
Sportico will be publishing one short business highlight every weekday (and on some weekend days) during the three-week NCAA tournament.
March 18: The NCAA’s Billion-Dollar Empire is Built on Basketball
March 19: How Much is an NCAA Tournament Win Worth?
March 20: Men’s vs. Women’s NCAA Tournament Money
March 21: Indexing the NCAA’s Corporate Sponsors
March 22: Largest Financial Mismatch Produces Biggest Upset
March 23: As Top Seeds Lose, Sportsbooks Win
March 24: #NotNCAAProperty Reaches Millions Online
March 25: Sidelined in 2020, TV Advertisers are Back in Force
March 26: Loyola’s Rambling Flutie Effect
