NCAA Selection Committee Chaired By UNC AD Puts UNC In Tournament

Image: iStockphoto / © Jim Dedmon-Imagn Images

By Cody McClure

“I recused myself,” he said.

Sure, man.

I’m sure the fact that you are the chairman of the committee had nothing to do with your school getting in the tournament despite your 1-11 mark against the Quad 1 this year.

Bubba Cunningham is the chairman of the NCAA Tournament selection committee and also happens to be the athletic director at North Carolina.

He says he was not in the room when the committee made their decision on the Tar Heels.

And North Carolina surprisingly made the field, bumping West Virginia out. Even though every single bracketologist (111 of them) said West Virginia was in.

Is this a conspiracy? Did the committee screw WVU? How much influence did the chairman have? Is it just brand power at its fine

st?

Some are saying this has a case to be the worst tournament snub in history.

North Carolina is a Blue Blood, no doubt, so perhaps the committee would have made this move anyway. Even if the chairman wasn’t the UNC AD.

Maybe.

But even if he wasn’t in the room, as he said, wouldn’t his presence as the chairman perhaps still have some influence on the other members?

This feels to me like West Virginia got screwed. I’ll give Carolina credit for being 8-2 down the stretch against a weak ACC schedule.

But the Mountaineers were 6-10 against the Quad 1 (five more wins than UNC).

They had quality wins against Gonzaga, Arizona, Kansas, and Iowa State.

Those are pretty stout wins. And sure, they took some bad losses, too. Which North Carolina didn’t do. But North Carolina didn’t beat anybody.

The Tar Heels’ best win was against UCLA, a 7-seed in the field.

I’m more of a reward good wins over punish bad losses guy. So to me, it was clearly a wrong decision to put Carolina in over the Mountaineers.

Was it done sneakily behind the scenes? Was it dirty? You be the judge.

I personally think it’s pretty egregious. I think the NCAA screwed hard-working Appalachian folks.

I also find it quite interesting that Cunningham landed a huge bonus following the Tar Heels’ inclusion in the tournament.