The NCAA is looking to expand college basketball this fall through a brand-new in-season tournament dubbed “Players Era.”
First reported by Amanda Christovich of Front Office Sports, the eight-team tournament, which plans to expand to 16 in 2025, will pay out $1 million to each participating team and an additional million to the champions.
The tournament would take place at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, with each team receiving free travel, lodging and meals during the event.
When a program receives money from the tournament, it’s distributed to the players individually by coaches, collectives and NIL operators. Not every player will likely receive the same amount of money, as the companies giving out these NIL deals will want to back a well-known, marketable superstar.
There is currently no minimum amount that a player is required to receive, but you have to imagine that coaches will ensure each player receives their own individually sized piece of the pie.
Players Era will be operated and backed by EverWonder Studio and AND1 CEO of Basketball, Seth Berger. While EverWonder is still looking for a broadcast partner, streaming-based and linear, it will be easy to attract one with all the seven-figure NIL deals being thrown around, as money tends to talk the loudest.
When the details behind Players Era finally went public, the NCAA was praised by fans and talking heads, including ESPN College Basketball analyst Jay Bilas, for its willingness to try something new.
“The money, that million dollars per team, goes into the university’s collective or into the school’s collective, and that way, it goes to the players,” Bilas said on College Gameday. “Like, who wouldn’t want to play in that?”
While nearly every team in the country would love a chance to compete in the first-of-its-kind tournament, Players Era has reported to be an invite-only event, with the NCAA in talks with Alabama, Duke, Florida Atlantic, Houston, Kansas, Oregon, San Diego State, St. John’s, Syracuse and Virginia.
The NCAA should aim to invite as many national brands as possible, not just the nation’s best teams. Getting as many people as possible to tune in to an In-Season college basketball tournament is vital to the success of the Players Era.
Getting these national brands to fly out to Vegas to compete at no additional cost will be easy but doing that requires this tournament to be successful and avoid becoming a one-and-done.
“Rather than going into a tournament and spending money to get there, it costs you money, and you’re not really making that much,” Bilas said. Now, the players are making money, and it’s going to—as this gets bigger, and I think it will—it’s going to go into March.”
Whilst Bilas really likes the idea of the Players Era, he made it an important point to raise the potential can of worms it could open for the NCAA in the future.
“You go to the NCAA Tournament, your players get a t-shirt? That’s going to be a thing, and the NCAA is gonna have to respond,” Bilas said. “Revenue sharing is coming, and they don’t want to admit it. But it’s coming, and now it’s here.”
Can an In-Season Tournament increase viewership during one of the slowest parts of the college basketball season?
Ask NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, who launched the NBA’s first-ever In-Season Tournament in 2023 as part of the association’s new collective bargaining agreement.
While the tournament received criticism when it was first announced, viewership absolutely skyrocketed. This was headlined by the NBA’s In-Season Tournament Championship Game on Dec. 9, which averaged 4.58 million viewers, according to Jon Lewis of Sports Media Watch. It became the most-watched NBA game outside of Christmas since February 2018.
Players Era’s viewership shouldn’t be a problem; how to distribute the money could cause headaches for the NCAA.
“It’s a revenue share model,” Bilas said. “Most of the tournaments are MTEs – multi-team events—are put forth by organizers who are making the money themselves. This is for the players to make money. And obviously, the organizers will do well, as well. But their goal is to have a financially equitable environment and to grow the game through great competition in the early season.”
If the NCAA can get this tournament right, it could quickly expand into the highly marketable women’s game, with similar tournaments eventually popping up throughout other college sports.
