68 teams, 6 rounds, 1 winner. The NCAA tournament is a tournament unlike any other. Teams and individual players put it all on the line for one goal, to be a champion. March is not only mad in the way of upsets and showdowns, but also in the crazy amount of money that goes into this enormous event. Economics play a huge role in the NCAA March Madness. Host cities rake in money from eager fans, teams and conferences make money from profit made on the tournament, and because the tournament has a limited supply of resources, prices skyrocket.
There are many ways that the NCAA generates revenue. Although the biggest way is through selling the the broadcast rights to television companies, ticket and appeal sales also play a role. Because the NCAA is a non-profit organization, ninety six percent of this close to $900 million the NCAA will make goes straight back to the basketball organizations. The money is given to each participating conference and the NCAA urges the conferences to distributed the money to each team in the conference. In 2011, CBS signed a fourteen year, $10.8 billion deal with the NCAA for broadcasting rights to the tournament games (investopedia.com). This is the largest piece of the puzzle when it comes to how much the NCAA makes on the tournament. Increased
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There is a limited number of seats in a basketball arena therefore, there is also a limited amount of tickets that can be sold. Despite games being expensive, fans are willing to pay top dollar to get into one of these game because they are so limited. The NCAA has no competition when it comes to ticket prices so they can charge whatever they want and people will still buy tickets simply because there are no other options. This is the same for tournament apparel. The apparel can only be made by the NCAA itself or companies that are given rights to the logos and symbols. This gives way to higher prices because of reduced