Some top coaches wanted a much later start, but the NCAA wasn't going to delay.
If Hall of Famers Rick Pitino, Mike Krzyzewski and others weary of playing during the pandemic had their way, the college basketball decisionmakers would've delayed the season's start and pushed back the postseason.
The NCAA tournament's branding of March Madness as the name of its premier event would take a break for a year — and the tournament would be known as May Madness or maybe Battle in the Bubble.
Pitino, the Hall of Fame coach now at Iona, argued publicly against playing nonconference games in November and December, hoping to keep his team safe. He also wanted to avoid the whole season getting shut down with COVID-19 numbers continuing to skyrocket across the country.
"Spiking and protocols make it impossible to play right now," Pitino, the former Louisville coach, tweeted 10 days before the Nov. 25 start to the season.
It's fair to question whether any games should've been played before January, even if that would have delayed Minnesota native Jalen Suggs from capturing the sport's imagination as the next big-time freshman.
With Suggs helping lead the way, Gonzaga has flexed its muscles as the nation's No. 1 team, hands down. Another top story line has been the Big Ten establishing itself as the most dominant conference in the country. So nonleague play did serve a purpose.
But in support of the case for delaying the season, look no further than the 13 teams that had not played a single game yet through Tuesday, including DePaul and eight of the 10 teams in the Patriot League. Forty-three out of 353 Division I teams had played three games or fewer, though only three of those were high-major programs.
