Tom Crean: Declining NIT Invitations is ‘Absolutely Ridiculous’
Selection Sunday provided an incredibly competitive bubble for the 2024 NCAA Tournament, with Oklahoma being the first team on the outside looking in on the Field of 68.
The Sooners finished the 2023-24 season in ninth place in the Big 12 with a 20-12 (8-10 Big 12) record, which arguably should’ve gotten them in the tournament considering the difficulty playing in the Big 12 provides.
With Oklahoma being the first team out, the Sooners were a virtual lock to land an NIT invitation and projected as a No. 1 seed. However, OU decided to decline their invitation.
While this has become a relatively common theme in college basketball, with teams like St. John’s, Memphis, Ole Miss, and Indiana all electing to do the same, Tom Crean wholeheartedly disagrees with the idea.
Crean, a former coach for the Hoosiers and current college basketball analyst with ESPN, went off on schools deciding not to give their teams one last chance to play together.
“I would want to coach. I’d want to develop my team,” Crean said. “You’ve got bigger staffs than you’ve ever had. There’s plenty of time for the (transfer) portal. Plenty of time to talk to recruits. There is plenty of time to negotiate NIL deals. There’s not plenty of time to play. There’s not plenty of time to get your players on the floor and give them a chance to get better. There’s not plenty of time for guys to continue to play; they may never get to play again.
“That, to me, is absolutely ridiculous. It’s each coach’s choice, and I get it, but you take away the chance to play the games and put your team on the floor. Let them opt out! The bowl season has it all the time, let it happen. Who cares? Give your players and coaches a chance to keep playing and coaching, and don’t shortchange them.”
The list of high-profile teams deciding to set their sights on 2024-25 shows just how much the game has changed in recent years. Actual college basketball games are taking a back seat to recruiting. Crean says to let the coaches go and do that, but teams should still be able to put guys on the court.
“If a guy doesn’t want to play, go sit down. If a coach doesn’t want to coach, go recruit,” Crean said. “There’s gotta be enough people to put five, six, seven people on the floor and go play. It makes absolutely no sense to me.”
The NCAA Tournament is set to begin with the First Four games on Tuesday night, with bracket play beginning on Thursday.
