Postgame Interviews 📈, Bracket Fun 📉
Plus: Stick figure drawings, the latest in the Shoe Wars, and an update in the Club Sportico bracket challenge
Here are six March Madness business items worthy of your attention at the start of the week…
What We Love ❤️: The postgame coach interview is saved. Normally one of the most bland, predictable elements of a broadcast, the chats have become stages for some fantastic player bits, including VCU’s superlative towel-stacking effort, and what appeared to be Utah State’s W-eating homage to Jameis Winston. Basketball players can’t dump Gatorade (for obvious reasons), and I’m glad to see them getting creative instead.
What We Hate 😡: If your school’s social media account has been relatively quiet amid their March Madness run, there’s a reason. The NCAA still prohibits institutions from posting their own highlights on TikTok and X. They can post up to one minute of footage per game on IG and Facebook, but only after the final whistle.
What We Think is Related ⚖️: Late Friday night, the NCAA announced it was suing DraftKings for infringing on its marketing and licensing rights. It accuses the sportsbook of illegally using trademarked terms like “March Madness,” “Elite Eight” and “Final Four.”
The NCAA has been fighting to resist (and in some cases, reverse) the seemingly-inevitable spread of sports betting, but it seems like too much of a coincidence that in the same week the governing body sued DraftKings for use of trademarks, the Virginia men’s basketball team was posting stick figure drawings in lieu of game footage.
What We’re (Not) Wearing 👟: Under Armour has dramatically scaled back its sports marketing spend in the last half decade, including the termination of many of its college sports partnerships.1 Until this year, however, that change had not been reflected in the company’s March Madness presence, where the success of a few teams covered the fissures in the overall portfolio.
The company’s college pull-back is finally starting to show. Only nine of the 68 teams in the men’s basketball tournament wear Under Armour, the lowest total in more than a decade. Of the 16 teams remaining, all but two are Nike/Jordan and none are Under Armour.
What Caught Our Eye 👀: A couple data points worth tracking: In NCAA tourney history, only twice has the Sweet 16 been made up entirely of major conference teams2. It happened in 2025 and again this year.3 This is also the fourth straight tournament that didn’t have multiple double-digit seeds in the Sweet 16. That’s never happened before.
What I’m Feeling 🪦: There’s been so much written already about how the changing business of college sports—NIL, revenue-sharing, transfer portal, etc.—may permanently kill the upsets and Cinderella runs that many fans love.
I’m4 honestly pretty tired of that discourse, but I’ve always been confused about how the deeply-flawed bracket challenge became the default version of March Madness office pools, and I do wonder if that process will look even sillier in a future where there are far fewer upsets. You either pick chalk and do well (but despise yourself) or you pick fun and lose. There’s really no winning.
Am I alone here, or are bracket challenges less fun now?
A Club Sportico Contest Update 🏆: Speaking of brackets! A trio of Sportico insiders are currently atop the list: Kurt, Eben 🐗, and Lev. Those of us who predicted more madness are struggling.
Club Sportico is a community organized by Sportico, a digital media company launched in 2020 to cover the business side of sports. You can read breaking news, smart analysis, and in-depth features from Eben, Jacob and their colleagues at Sportico.com, and listen to the Sporticast podcast wherever you get your audio. Contact us at club@sportico.com.
Other notable departures include the group’s massive agreement to take over MLB uniforms, and its high-profile split with Steph Curry.
A Club Sportico judge has ruled that St. John’s and UConn, two Big East programs, qualify as “major conference” programs.
One team has been in both the Sweet 16 and the College Football Playoff: Alabama.
Eben here.