As March Madness basketball games begin this week, several HBCU programs will compete in multiple postseason tournaments. However, this year’s brackets for the National Invitational Tournament (NIT) and the College Basketball Invitational (CBI.) will not include a single team from the Division I HBCU ranks.
This year marks the second consecutive year that the 87-year-old National Invitational Tournament will not include an HBCU program. The last team to compete in the annual contest was Alcorn State in 2023. That year, Alcorn State lost to North Texas 69-53 in the event’s first round.
HBCU in the NIT
In considering current teams competing in the Southwestern Athletic Conference, the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference, as well as Division I schools — Hampton, North Carolina A&T, and Tennessee State — in nontraditional HBCU conferences, there have only been seven times where the NIT has included an HBCU program in at least two or more consecutive seasons. There have only been four instances — 1993, 2007, 2008, and 2011 — where the selection committee has invited multiple HBCU programs in its nearly 90 years of existence.
Expect that to be the norm, though, as the MEAC and SWAC have lost NIT autobids along with other smaller conferences in recent years.
HBCU in the CBI
The first rendition of the CBI took place in 2008. The CBI committee selects 16 teams that are not awarded bids to the men’s NCAA tournament or the NIT and programs willing to pay a $27,500 entry fee to participate. This year marks the 12th instance — the tournament was canceled in 2020 due to COVID-19 — in the 17-year-old competition that an HBCU will not compete in this year’s tournament field.
Bethune Cookman participated in the 2024 College Basketball Invitational competition, losing to Arkansas State 86-85 in the tournament’s first round. Since the event’s inception, only four programs have participated in the five total occurrences in the 16-team bracket. Those teams include Hampton (2014, 2017), Delaware State (2015), and Howard (2019), in addition to the Wildcats.
More postseason tournaments were created to provide extra opportunities for programs to showcase their prowess on the national stage. However, even with more opportunities, getting more HBCU programs eligible or in a position to receive an invitation to other postseason competitions will be a continuing process.