The Nebraska men’s basketball team will play the Arizona State Sun Devils in the first round of the inaugural College Basketball Crown tournament on Monday, March 31. The tournament is promoted by the Anschultz Entertainment Group and Fox Sports.
It will be held at the T-Mobile and MGM Grand Garden Arenas. The 16-team tournament is also breaking ground by awarding Name, Image, and Likeness payments to the winning teams. Nebraska head coach Fred Hoiberg tells Fox Sports that there’s always a benefit to having your team compete for a championship.
“Any time you have a chance to compete for a championship, there definitely is a benefit for your program. Our guys were unanimous about going out and playing, and that is a good sign for everything you have going with the culture of your program when your guys want to keep playing together and compete.”
The Nebraska Cornhuskers will face the Arizona State Sun Devils in the first round of the College Basketball Crown on Monday, March 31. Tip-off is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. CT, and the game can be seen on FS1.
Why another postseason tournament?
Executive Vice President of Fox Sports Jordan Bazant believes that college basketball needs to improve the student-athletes’ experience.
“College football has evolved in so many ways. There’s no big-game bowl experience for basketball programs. We have 12 NBA teams coming to this event, if not more. If you’re in the NCAA Tournament or the NIT, you can’t send someone to every game. At our event, you can, and we’ll have NBA people at every single game. It’s exposure that they wouldn’t otherwise have For our programs, this is their first game and first week in the 2025-26 year. It cleanses you of the year you’ve had to a degree, or it provides that next step for a program.”
Selection process
The tournament selected two automatic qualifiers from the Big Ten, Big 12, and Big East Conferences. At-large teams that did not qualify for the NCAA Tournament filled the remaining ten spots. The automatic qualifiers came from conferences that have existing media relationships with Fox Sports.
TV partner
The tournament will exclusively air on Fox and FS1, as Fox Sports is one of the founding partners of the College Basketball Crown.
Delined bids
Nine teams declined bids to the College Basketball Crown. Those teams include Indiana, Iowa, Kansas State, Northwestern, Ohio State, Penn State, Rutgers, TCU, and West Virginia.
NIL payments
The tournament is breaking ground by awarding NIL payments to participating schools. The championship team will win a $300,000 NIL package, the runner-up will earn a $100,000 package, and the semifinalists will receive $50,000.
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