I propose that basketball is sufficiently luck-driven that, like baseball, a single elimination tournament is a poor way to discover the best team.

Naturally, there are far too many competing schools to suggest an eight or sixteen team best-of-seven playoff, but at the very least, a double-elimination tournament, with entry based on merit only, would be a more defensible way to crown a "National Champion."

Perhaps award half of the field by computer rankings, half by human rankings, expanding as necessary to fill the available 64 or 32 slots. (If there isn't overlap between the two ranking systems, there's a real problem.) Intentionally letting inferior teams compete in the tournament because of guaranteed slots smacks of entitlement and is, dare I suggest, un-American.

Or maybe I'm just still in the denial stage.