The 2025 College Basketball Crown (CBC) was a single-elimination, fully-bracketed men's college basketball postseason tournament featuring sixteen National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I teams not selected to participate in the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament. It commenced on March 31 and concluded on April 6. All games were played on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada, with all first-round and quarterfinal games at the MGM Grand Garden Arena and the semifinal and final games at The first-round and quarterfinal games aired on FS1 and the semifinal and final games on Fox.
The bracket was unveiled on March 17, 2025, during the FS1 show Breakfast Ball by Fox Sports college basketball broadcaster, writer, and insider John Fanta. The tournament featured a Name, Image, And Likeness (NIL) prize pool that paid $300,000 for the championship team, $100,000 to the runner-up team, and $50,000 to each of the other two teams that reach the semifinals but failed to advance.
The University of Nebraska Cornhuskers defeated the University of Central Florida Knights 77–66 to claim the championship. The All-Tournament Team was composed of Tyson Degenhart (Boise State), Eric Dixon (Villanova), Juwan Gary (Nebraska), Darius Johnson (UCF) and Brice Williams (Nebraska); Gary was also selected Most Valuable Player.
Participating teams Note: Team records are as of the beginning of the tournament. TeamConferenceOverallrecordNETrankBidtypeArizona StateBig 12 74 At-largeBoise StateMountain West 44 At-largeButlerBig East 83 AutomaticCincinnatiBig 12 50 AutomaticColoradoBig 12 86 At-largeDePaulBig East 119 At-largeGeorge WashingtonAtlantic 10 124 At-largeGeorgetownBig East 88 At-largeNebraskaBig Ten 59 AutomaticOregon StateWest Coast 85 At-largeTulaneAmerican Athletic 145 At-largeUCFBig 12 71 AutomaticUSCBig Ten 70 AutomaticUtahBig 12 73 At-largeVillanovaBig East 55 AutomaticWashington StateWest Coast 112 At-large
Rejected bids
Indiana Iowa Kansas State Northwestern Ohio State Penn State Rutgers TCU West Virginia
Field synopsis
Rankings, ratings and records were through March 16, 2025 Selection Sunday and prior to any additional post-season activity. This also includes a "KNIT" score, which is leveraged as a criteria and evaluation tool for the National Invitation Tournament selection committee; it average of the following seven metrics, then ranks based on the results:
BTR: Bart Torvik "T-Rank" Ranking BPI: ESPN Basketball Power Index KPR: Ken Pomeroy College Basketball Ratings (aka "KenPom") KPI: Kevin Pauga Index NET: NCAA Evaluation Tool SOR: Strength Of Record, as calculated by ESPN WAB: Wins Above Bubble, as calculated by Bart Torvik
The operators of the CBC have not publicly disclosed the criteria used to select participating teams. It is unknown whether one, some, all or none of the metrics mentioned above were considered in deciding which teams to invite. While each of the Big 12, Big East and Big Ten conferences committed to send two teams to the tournament, how these teams were chosen is unknown. BidKNITSchoolConferenceConferencePlaceConferenceW–LDivisionIW–LOverallW–LBTRBPIKPRKPINETSORWABRoadW–LNeutralW–LHomeW–LQuad1W–LQuad2W–LQuad3W–LQuad4W–LNonD-IW–LAt-Large51Boise StateMountain WestT–4th50485050445553Automatic54CincinnatiBig 12T–12th44405566505961Automatic55NebraskaBig TenT–12th62555455596057Automatic59VillanovaBig East6th52415695556171Automatic67UCFBig 12T–12th69646875716567Automatic69USCBig TenT–12th59606369708381At-Large75UtahBig 1211th67617696737576At-Large76Arizona StateBig 1215th65777082748180At-Large86ColoradoBig 1216th818281100869193Automatic88ButlerBig EastT–8th7765771358397118At-Large90GeorgetownBig East7th948487129888298At-Large92Oregon StateWest Coast5th9198851138510890At-Large110Washington StateWest CoastT–6th106114124116112106105At-Large117George WashingtonAtlantic 10T–7th116116113119124126135At-Large122DePaulBig East10th112105118170119118138At-Large150TulaneAmerican Athletic4th13812713817414515417487Average9th807782103848994
Schedule GameTimeMatchupScoreBoxscoreAttendanceTelevisionFirst round – 112:00 pmUtah vs. Butler84–86Box score2,119FS122:30 pmGeorge Washington vs. Boise State59–89Box score35:30 pmNebraska vs. Arizona State86–78Box score2,94748:00 pmGeorgetown vs. Washington State85–82Box scoreFirst round – 512:00 pmDePaul vs. Cincinnati 61–83Box score1,495FS162:30 pmOregon State vs. UCF75–76Box score75:30 pmColorado vs. Villanova 64–85Box score2,40788:00 pmTulane vs. USC60–89Box scoreQuarterfinals – 94:00 pmButler vs. Boise State93–100Box score2,512FS1106:30 pmNebraska vs. Georgetown81–69Box scoreQuarterfinals – 114:00 pmCincinnati vs. UCF80–88Box score2,279FS1126:30 pmVillanova vs. USC 60–59Box score Semifinals – 1310:30 amBoise State vs. Nebraska69–79Box score2,972Fox141:00 pmUCF vs. Villanova104–98 OTBox scoreFinal – 152:30 pmNebraska vs. UCF77–66Box score3,314FoxGame times are Pacific Daylight Time.
Bracket
Quality of participating teams compared with NIT
Fox Sports leveraged its media rights relationships with the Big East, Big Ten, and Big 12 conferences to create the CBC and thereby create postseason college basketball content for itself. Each of those three conferences committed to send at least two teams to the CBC. In addition, non-NCAA tournament teams from those three conferences were contractually prohibited from playing in any other postseason tournament, including the 2025 National Invitation Tournament (NIT), if they declined an invitation or removed themselves from consideration for a bid to the CBC. Even if Big East, Big Ten, or Big 12 schools might have preferred to play NIT games at home instead of CBC games in Las Vegas or anticipated they might have more attractive matchups in the NIT, they did not have that option, which may have degraded the quality of the NIT field. No Big East or Big Ten teams appeared in the 2025 NIT, and Oklahoma State was the only Big 12 team to accept an NIT bid. Atlantic Coast Conference teams Georgia Tech, SMU, and Stanford were the only other power conference teams to accept bids to the NIT. In contrast, eleven of the sixteen CBC participants were from power conferences.
An analysis of the NET rankings as of Selection Sunday for the teams participating in the 2025 CBC and NIT is set forth in the table below.
CBC participantsNIT participantsTeamNETTeamNETTeamNETBoise State 44SMU 46Middle Tennessee 105Cincinnati 50Santa Clara 57UAB 106Villanova 55UC Irvine 62Loyola Chicago 107Nebraska 59San Francisco 64Utah Valley 108USC 70North Texas 65Georgia Tech 109UCF 71Dayton 67Florida Atlantic 111Utah 73George Mason 68North Alabama 113Arizona State 74Saint Joseph's 76Northern Colorado 114Butler 83Bradley 80Chattanooga 115Oregon State 85Stanford 81Samford 116Colorado 86Northern Iowa 93Jacksonville State 122Georgetown 88Arkansas State 94Furman 127Washington State 112Oklahoma State 95Kent State 128DePaul 119St. Bonaventure 97Wichita State 134George Washington 124Saint Louis 101UC Riverside 142Tulane 145Cal State Northridge 104San Jose State 175 Mean: 84Median: 79Best: 44Worst: 145Top 16 teamsMean: 78Median: 78Best: 46Worst: 104All 32 teamsMean: 99Median: 105Best: 46Worst: 175 Like all metrics used to rank or rate college basketball teams, the NET is imperfect; however, it is consistently applied and represents one way in which teams can be compared. Since the NIT had to fill thirty-two tournament berths, whereas the CBC had only sixteen, data are shown for both the full NIT field as well as the top sixteen teams based on NET rankings. Of course, there are other metrics that could be used to compare the fields of the two tournaments, including the number of power conference teams participating.
See also 2025 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament 2025 National Invitation Tournament 2025 College Basketball Invitational
References
External links College Basketball Crown official website