Played 1980–present Conference Mid-American Conference Current stadium Quicken Loans Arena TV partners Spectrum Sports, ESPN2 | Last contest 2017 Current location Cleveland Number of teams 12 | |
Format Single-elimination tournament Most championships Ball State Cardinals (7) Official website mac-sports.com/Sports/BasketballM.aspx Current champion Kent State Golden Flashes men's basketball (6) | ||
The Mid-American Conference Men's Basketball Tournament is the postseason single-elimination tournament for the NCAA Division I Mid-American Conference (MAC). The winner of the tournament receives the MAC's automatic bid to the NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship. Each of the 12 men's basketball teams in the MAC are eligible for the tournament. Since 2000, the MAC Tournament has been held at Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio. The finals are broadcast on ESPN2 and the semi and quarterfinals are broadcast on Spectrum Sports and ESPN3.
Contents
The tournament was first played in 1980, when it was won by Toledo. Ball State has won the most tournaments with seven.
Format
Seeding for the tournament is determined by winning percentage, regardless of conference division. Ties in winning percentage are broken as follows:
1. Between TWO teams: A. Head-to-head competition; B. Division Record (only used if the two teams in question are tied for the Division lead); C. Winning percentage vs. ranked conference teams (top to bottom, regardless of division, vs. common opponents regardless of the number of times played); D. Coin flip
2. For MULTIPLE (3 or more) team ties: A. Total won-lost record/winning percentage of games played among the tied teams; B. Two (2)-team tie-breaker procedure goes into effect
The top four seeds receive byes into the quarterfinals. Seeds 5-12 play first-round games at the campus of the higher seed. Winners of the first-round games advance to face the top four seeds in the quarterfinal round in Cleveland, Ohio.
Historical formats
From 2012 through 2015, the No. 1 and No. 2 seeds received byes straight to the semifinals, with the No. 3 and No. 4 seeds beginning tournament play in the quarterfinals. Teams seeded 5–12 played an additional two rounds. First round games are played at the home sites of the higher seeds, with the remaining rounds being contested at Quicken Loans Arena. Under this format, a team seeded fifth or lower had to win four games in six days, while playing five games in eight days, to win the conference tournament. The division winners were guaranteed to receive a seed not lower than four.
From 2002 through 2011, the format for the conference tournament was similar to current format. Each of the 12 (13 from 2002-2005) teams in the MAC received a berth in the tournament, with the top four seeds receiving byes into the quarterfinals. Unlike the current format, division winners were guaranteed at least the No 2 seed. First round games for seeds 5-12 were played at the home sites of the higher seeds, with the remaining rounds being contested at Quicken Loans Arena.
From 1980 through 1988, seven teams qualified for the three-round tournament. The No. 1 seed received a bye into the semifinals. In 1989, an eighth team was added and each of the teams participated in all three rounds. In 2000, the tournament was expanded to four rounds and included all 13 teams in the league. The top three teams received byes into the quarterfinals.
Performance by school
* No longer member of MAC