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NCAA MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP MEDIA CONFERENCE

March 13, 2019

Bernard Muir

Indianapolis, Indiana

DAVE WORLOCK: Hello, everyone. Thank you all for joining us today. The Division I Men's Basketball Committee is here in New York City this week for the annual selections meeting, which began today at the Marriott Marquis for the fourth consecutive year.

The meeting began this morning with some non-selections related business, but after this call the committee will begin the selection process with the casting of the initial ballots. The meeting, of course, continues through Sunday, and the announcement of the 68 teams will take place Sunday at 6 p.m. eastern exclusively on CBS.

I'd like to turn it over to Bernard Muir for a quick comment, then Bernard will take questions from the media.

BERNARD MUIR: Thank you for your time today. As David said, I'm in New York City with my colleagues where we're minutes away from taking the first step of putting teams in the field with the casting of our initial ballot.

That process involves each committee members voting up to 36 at-large teams, which the individual fields are locked to make the field regardless of what happens moving forward.

To make it into the field, teams must receive all but two eligible votes in this initial ballot. Remember, ADs or commissioners can't vote for their own teams, which is why we say all but two eligible votes.

In other words, Duke AD Kevin White a member of the committee, Duke needs seven out of a possible nine votes to get into the field. North Carolina, in the same conference, needs at least eight votes to make it on the initial ballot.

Normally we have about 25 teams that will make it into the field on the initial ballot. We'll see how that goes later today. We also will vote for teams we feel deserve consideration for a possible at-large bid. Committee members can vote for as many team as they wish.

A team receiving at least three votes and all teams that won the regular season conference championship appear on the under consideration board. In a typical year we have 40 to 45 teams that qualify for inclusion on that board. From there we'll use two lists to select and seed for the next several days, going back and forth.

Hopefully that gives you an explanation for how the process begins. At this point I'm happy to take any questions you may have at this time.

Q. The news yesterday, Stanford has put out a statement, but we haven't heard from you regarding the events and allegations. What have you learned in the last 24 hours and have you been doing any rethinking personally?
BERNARD MUIR: I would say it was a disappointing day for our Stanford community. I will stick to the statement at this time. But we continue to reflect on this. Obviously we'll use it as a learning experience for our athletic community to ensure it doesn't happen again.

Q. You've been on the committee in past years, so you have been through this process with RPI. Now there's no RPI. The dust hasn't all settled yet, but thus far throughout this season, up to where we are now, what has been the effect for you and for the committee in analyzing teams without RPI and do you think it's been a positive effect?
BERNARD MUIR: Great question. I do think it has been a positive effect. With the new NET tool, which is really a sorting tool for us, has been able to allow the committee members to look at something more contemporary, which is what we wanted when we initially set out.

Each and every game as we go along throughout the season, the NET is something I think has become more reliable for the committee. Each committee member will use this sorting tool as well as other tools we have at our disposal in their own way. That discussion will happen, unfold starting today, but over the next several days.

I think all in all, we are quite pleased with the tool we have at hand.

Q. How can the committee view LSU given all the uncertainty around everything there, including the fact that the coach and possibly a key player, nobody knows if they're going to be available in a week or this week?
BERNARD MUIR: Another good question. We will spend a lot of time on not only LSU but other schools that have player availability issues, injuries, suspensions, talking through that. We'll be in contact. We'll get information or seek information from conference offices, in this case for your question, the SEC, to see if they're knowledgeable about anything that would be benefit to the committee.

We'll watch what happens in the SEC tournament, observe how in this case the Tigers will play in the coming week, then make our assessments as to where we think they should fall as we move forward with this process.

Q. Any chance they wouldn't be in the tournament because of what we know now?
BERNARD MUIR: That's an institutional decision. They're working through their process. But as far as we know, they're eligible for the tournament. Then we're going to, like I said, evaluate how they perform this week and then make our judgments as it compares to the rest of the field.

Q. Have you ever seen where a coach was suspended going into the tournament, and how did that maybe influence things?
BERNARD MUIR: I have not seen it recently, or at least I can't recall recently having that issue. I know during the course of a season, you'll have a coach sit out or have to sit out for a number of different reasons. It requires us to just spend some time to really talk thoroughly about a particular team, how we think they might do.

Again, in this case, as we were talking about LSU, we'll have to see how they perform this week when they get into their post-season tournament.

Q. In other words, you use strictly performance, right? Not anything outside?
BERNARD MUIR: We're not speculating on anything. We don't reserve judgment. It's really what the team has done, who is available, how we think they're going to play in the post-season, the NCAA post-season. That's all we have to go on.

Q. Big 12 related questions. When you guys are evaluating a conference, do you factor in the precedent you may or may not set by possibly including 80% of the league into the tournament?
BERNARD MUIR: We do not look at conference necessarily. We're looking at a team's overall body of work. I know you heard that committee speak before. But truly we're not looking within a conference to see how well did they do necessarily. We're looking at the games played. In some conferences, there might be more Q1 games or Q2 games than others. We're really looking at it on a team-by-team basis. There's no maximum or minimum number of at-large bids based on a particular conference in our minds.

Q. Specifically to Texas, they could finish .500, their NET ranking is pretty good, have some good non-conference wins, to use the same word, a precedent of possibly putting in a .500 team, or do you evaluate each team individually?
BERNARD MUIR: The latter point. We evaluate each team individually. We'll look at Texas's rÃ©sumÃ© in this case and see how they stack up to the rest of the field. That's going to be the barometer as to whether Texas gets in or not.

Q. How fluid is the No. 1 seeds line at this stage?
BERNARD MUIR: Good question. I think we would say there's probably six or seven teams. Again, we haven't gotten into deliberations. I'm guessing there's probably six or seven teams that are worthy to be considered on the No. 1 line.

We'll have to have a lot of discussion this week as people continue to build on their rÃ©sumÃ©. We'll have a chance to assess that and see who ultimately belongs on that 1 line.

Q. I'm going to assume Kentucky is one of those six or seven teams. With Louisville being one of the regional sites, how sensitive is the committee to the idea that let's say Kentucky becomes a No. 2 seed, sent to Louisville, how the No. 1 seed going to Louisville...
BERNARD MUIR: We make a point of making sure the teams play close to their national region. In this case, the one you just mentioned with Kentucky, if they happen to be next in line, and Louisville is available, the committee will not have a problem putting them in that potential region provided there's no other conflict.

Q. This seems to have been a year when the major conferences have been sort of down the line mediocre, a year when the mid-majors and lower-majors have had some really outstanding victories. If you look at your ranking, what you've done so far, do you see this as a possible year when the mid-majors and lower-majors might receive at-large bids?
BERNARD MUIR: Our charge is to take the best 36 teams, at-large teams. We're going to look at a number of rÃ©sumÃ©s coming from both the power five conferences and the mid-majors. There was a lot of good basketball that continues to be played. We see that this week, especially with championship week.

We're just looking at this current season. We're going to look at a number of different rÃ©sumÃ©s. I think we're going to have a heck of a tournament just because there's so much parity in the game. I think that's what makes this championship so alluring to many. Anything can happen on any given day. We've seen that play out throughout the course of the season, just like you mentioned.

Q. How important or how big of a priority is it for the committee to make each of the regions equal as best as you can determine it?
BERNARD MUIR: That's a key bracketing principle for us. We want to create in each of the four regions a balanced bracket. It is a priority. It's one of our principles, something we look at. We try to be within five in terms of the overall seeding. When it gets to bracketing time, we'll spend quite a bit of time making sure we balance the bracket.

Q. How impactful will the return of players like Zion Williamson, Reid Travis for Kentucky, how much will that weigh on whatever the committee decides?
BERNARD MUIR: We'll certainly be discussing player availability, injuries. The other thing you have to keep in mind is when a student-athlete comes back, sometimes they're not at 100%. We'll evaluate that. We'll have opportunity this week with conference championship games, conference tournaments, to be able to see how a team is performing.

The injuries you just mentioned to those individuals, to those teams, we'll be able to kind of assess and have a discussion about that this coming week.

Q. Things that have mattered to the committee in the past, with the new NET evaluation going on, how will they affect seedings and selections in terms of strength of schedule and road wins? How important will those two things be this year?
BERNARD MUIR: I think they're still very important to the committee. I can't speak for all committee members, all 10 of us, because each of us weigh different things. But road wins we do talk about. Strength of schedule we talk about. We're going to talk about what happens in the various quadrants, how teams perform overall, what their win percentage is. Each and every committee member will take all those things into account. That is no different.

The NET is unique. It's new, contemporary. For us, it's a tremendous sorting tool that we will continue to use and draw from.

Q. Here in Richmond, Virginia, we have VCU. They weren't in the tournament last year. In previous years when they've been in, they've been to Portland, San Diego, Portland, Detroit. Will the committee take that into account and try to keep VCU or any school in a similar situation closer to home for its fan base this year?
BERNARD MUIR: We look at each season differently. At the same token it's a secondary consideration if a team is repeatedly shipped outside a region. As we're doing the bracketing, we're attempting to keep teams closest to their natural region.

Like I said, it's a secondary consideration if a team repeatedly over the past history has been sent outside its natural region. We'll take that into account.

Q. A team like Houston, looking at their NET right now, the fact they go into their conference tournament off of a championship, they were in the top 16 when you did your initial reveal, how much can you look at a team like that and weigh record and conference tournament in terms of moving from that 3 line to a 2 line? Is it based on the team you have? Is that a hard move to make this late?
BERNARD MUIR: I would say this. At this point we have some work to do. We've got to evaluate that first quadrant completely. I think what we saw a month ago and what we've printed out as part of the bracket reveal, it will change. That's why this week is so important, we get to see additional games.

We'll evaluate in this case Houston versus some other members in the field in that first quadrant to see exactly where they may fall.

Certainly with their 29-2 record, it is quite impressive what they've been able to accomplish over the course of the season. We have taken note and will continue to discuss, I can assure you, this week. We're anxious to watch them continue to play in their conference tournament.

DAVE WORLOCK: Thank you. The next media availability for Bernard on a national level will be at 9 p.m. eastern on Sunday night. Have a great day.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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