New NCAA Tournament rule benefits the #1 overall seed

Happy Tuesday, 'Nova Nation! I thought the most interesting thing to come out of last night's news cycle was a new NCAA Tournament rule that is really going to incentivize programs to try and earn the #1 overall seed. Under the new rule, the top team will get to choose their first and second round site.

Now you might be thinking, "Who cares, that team already gets the best site for them anyways?" And you'd be half-right. But because the NCAA currently prioritizes geography above all else (so they say), you can end up with situations where the elite teams travel less, but end up in a less desirable location.

Yahoo's Jeff Eisenberg lays out a few good examples of this in his explainer below. If you're looking for a (bad) Villanova-specific example, let's say both Baltimore and New York are sites. Geography would say go to Baltimore, as it's a shorter trip by miles. But Villanova would almost certainly rather play in alumni-rich NYC (not to mention in a familiar arena).

Most years, this probably won't matter. But all in all, a good rule change and a nice reward for the best team from the regular season.

And now, the "news."

Selection committee creates new incentive to land No. 1 overall seed | Yahoo Sports
College basketball’s elite teams have a new incentive to vie for the No. 1 overall seed in the NCAA tournament. Starting next March, the No. 1 overall seed will have the chance to select the regional site where it plays first- and second-round games.

Bruce Rasmussen Named Vice Chair of NCAA's Men's Basketball Committee | GoCreighton.com
The Bluejays' AD will be the vice chair of the NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Committee for the 2016-17 season.

Josh Hart exemplifies the humble yet relentless culture of Villanova basketball | Big East Coast Bias
An undersized and position-less point forward type in high school, Josh Hart was never projected to be a star. His outside jumper was raw, temper consistently flaring, and skills constantly criticized.

Eli Brooks adds Villanova offer, will weigh options | ZagsBlog
Brooks is racking up the offers -- Ohio State is the latest -- and he plans to sit down and discuss his options with family before making a commitment.

Maalik Wayns enjoying Philadelphia homecoming during TBT | City of Basketball Love
Maalik Wayns keeps finding his way back to Philadelphia. And he doesn’t have a problem with that at all.

College Basketball Exempt Tournaments 101 | Blogging the Bracket
Ever find yourself wondering why your favorite college basketball team has 31 games scheduled but your rival only has 29 lined up? No? Oh well, I still have all the answers to questions you didn't know you had about college hoops' exempt tournaments.

As evaluation period nears its end, dominoes starting to fall | ESPN ($)
Eli Brooks' potential commitment is just one of many potential dominoes set to fall in the next month.

Impact of up-transferring players on college basketball | SI.com
Which teams have been impacted the most by up-transferring, the trend of college players becoming immediately eligible for better teams?

Inquirer editorial: Penn State, Temple, and football-induced delusion
Perhaps concerned that Penn State's status as a national monument to sports-inspired mass delusion was not completely secure, more than 200 former football players recently petitioned university officials to reerect a bronze likeness of tarnished coaching

The Shot to Start it All: How CoBL came to be | City of Basketball Love
The funny thing about life-changing moments is that they aren’t always obvious at the time. It can take days, weeks, months, even years to look back on those events and realize what an impact they had, to wonder what would have happened if things had been different, even just a little bit.

The Olympics are giving athletes 450,000 condoms to keep up with their sex demands | SBNation.com
Oh my ...

Look how good Nike is at hiding other shoes in USA Basketball photos | SBNation.com
This year's Team USA photo covers non-Nike shoes, just as past photos have.