March Madness History
The history of March Madness didn’t start at a college or a university; it initiates with a small high school invitational. In 1908, the Illinois High School Association initiates sponsoring a small invitational tournament for boys’ basketball teams. During the 1930's, more than 900 schools around the state were taking part in the tournament. But, it was not until the term “March Madness” was used in an article for the invitational that the phrase started to be popular in US basketball.
Currently, “March Madness” is a phrase used to refer the season-ending playoffs of the NCAA tournament played in March. Originally, the term was first used by Henry V. Porter, the assistant executive secretary of the Illinois High School Association, who used it to entitle an essay about the phenomenon of the high school boys’ tournament. However, the term was connected to the NCAA tournament in the early 1980’s and was used almost exclusively in indication to state high school tournaments. March Madness is also a registered trademark, held jointly by the NCAA and the Illinois High School Association.
March Madness has gone from the reserved early expansion of a championship game being played from an eight-team tournament in 1939, to the most important college tournament. At the beginning, only one team from each conference was permitted into the NCAA Tournament. The reason for the small number of teams was not the lack of schools; it was that another more prominent tournament (the NIT) was taking privileged teams. However, it wasn’t until all the teams began playing equally at both tournaments, that March Madness initiated having recognition and importance.
As it applies to college basketball, the term originally referred to the conference basketball tournaments, although in recent years has been used to refer to the NCAA tournament itself. The term has also become popular in the sports betting industry, which has entailed 49 games called the March Madness Bracket, which actually runs into early April.
Most fans and people around the college basketball level would agree that March Madness was popularized by the sportscaster of CBS Brent Musburger. Today, March Madness has increased its popularity and is one of the most important tournaments in the college level.
Copyright © 2010. Sports Betting InstantActionSports.com. All rights reserved.
March Madness Betting. BetIAS Sportsbook.