Sixty-seven video games unfold throughout six arenas. A whole lot of gamers, coaches and officers scattered throughout a half-dozen lodges. And 68 groups, all remoted from one another each second of the day — apart from these 40 minutes on the sport clock.
“If you condense 14 websites into one and convey 68 groups collectively to play 67 video games in three weeks, it’s a logistical problem,” stated Dan Gavitt, the NCAA’s senior vp of basketball. “However it’s an thrilling one, and one which we’ve embraced.”
The lads’s event, which began Thursday, is often staged in 14 cities throughout the nation. Final yr, the occasion was canceled altogether, dashing championship desires and costing the NCAA and its member colleges a whole bunch of tens of millions of {dollars} in lost revenue. This yr it’s being held completely in and round Indianapolis — a rigorously coordinated, extremely scrutinized, 19-day affair at a time when coronavirus instances, whereas falling, are a number of instances increased than they had been when the event was scratched a yr in the past. It isn’t a strict “bubble,” per se, however organizers are calling the event a “managed surroundings,” as they hope to restrict publicity to the coronavirus.
