Countless stadiums, arenas, golf tournaments and bowl games have sponsors in their titles. The world’s most prestigious soccer league was named the Barclays Premier League until 2016. Private equity firms currently hold ownership stakes in more than 60 North American sports franchises, according to Pitchbook, as well as many of the top soccer clubs in Europe.

But when news broke Thursday that the Big 12 is entertaining both a potential title sponsorship deal with insurance giant Allstate and a $1 billion private equity partnership, you could almost hear the collective reaction: “How dare they?!”

Kirk Wakefield, a Baylor University marketing professor, had a much different reaction to the possible title sponsorship.

“You wonder why people haven’t done that already,” said Wakefield, who runs a research firm that studies sponsorship impacts for sports leagues and brands. “It’s such an obvious opportunity.”

USC sports business professor David Carter looks at the plight of the Big 12, which lags hundreds of millions a year in revenue behind the Big Ten and SEC, and sees private equity as a matter of Darwinian survival. To win national championships, Big 12 schools need to be able to spend like…

On Jan. 19, two days after he became the most coveted football player in the NCAA’s transfer portal, and mere hours after he welcomed Ohio State coaches for a recruiting visit, Caleb Downs announced his change-of-address plans. The freshman safety who’d earned second-team All-America honors at Alabama committed to the Buckeyes. Not long after, Downs and his father began relocating to Columbus.

Getting there was simple enough. Getting around was another matter.

Some wheels needed to be put in motion.

“I get a call from someone on the coaching staff and they said, ‘Hey, I’m here with Caleb and his dad now. Are you looking to add somebody else to your team?’” says Rick Ricart, the CEO and owner of Ricart Automotive Group in Columbus. “Would you be willing to do a car deal for him?’”

For decades, these were shifty conversations. Local car dealerships had long been conduits for the whispered inducements coaches or boosters promised talented players. When discovered, scandal erupted. Repercussions were often stark. Then came the seismic summer of 2021, when changes to Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) rules allowed college athletes to earn money without fear of NCAA sanctions.

Car dealers nationwide quickly exchanged leases and keys for players boasting about their new…

CLEVELAND — There weren’t screams of outrage across the basketball landscape when the coaching staffs for Saturday’s inaugural Women’s College All-Star Game were announced several weeks ago, but there were whispers and raised eyebrows.

Did you hear? Can you believe it? What were they thinking?

The questions revolved around the inclusion of Cynthia Cooper as a volunteer assistant. While definitely a basketball legend, which is how she and the three other coaches were described in the announcement, Cooper also was the focal point of a damning and disturbing 2022 investigative report by The Athletic that outlined allegations of inappropriate, vulgar and verbally abusive behavior toward players on multiple teams over multiple decades.

She resigned from Texas Southern two years ago and had stayed out of the coaching spotlight until her photo appeared alongside those of Nancy Lieberman, Janice Braxton and Cheryl Miller in the press release. The reaction may have been muted nationally, but the pain was very real among the former players who spoke out in the article.

“She needs to apologize to every player she hurt publicly and make a statement,” one of them told The Athletic…

The full NCAA Tournament bracket has been released with UConn leading the way as No. 1 overall.

(Editor’s note: This is part of the Bracket Central Series, an inside look at the run-up to the men’s and women’s NCAA Tournaments, along with analysis and picks during the tournaments.)

Eight double-digit seeds secured first-round upsets in the NCAA Tournament to bust brackets across the country. But when the dust settled on the opening weekend, only one double-digit seed was left standing in the Sweet 16: No. 11 NC State in the South Region.

Despite a season filled with so many evenly-matched teams, every No. 1 and No. 2 seed is still alive in the Sweet 16 for the first time in five years and just the fifth time since the NCAA Tournament began seeding in 1979. Of the 16 games involving one or two seeds, only three were decided by single digits.

With the Sweet 16 upon us, here are our latest NCAA Tournament power rankings for all 16 remaining national title contenders. Consider this our re-seeding of the Sweet 16, if you wish. We will update this ranking after every round and until the Final Four begins. Many of the top-seeded teams have looked dominant. Which one is in the best position to make a run at the championship? Here’s a look at where things stand:

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Good morning! Close out that task before overtime today.

While You Were Sleeping: Can every game go to overtime?

Two high seeds entered last night’s games in position to advance to their respective Sweet 16s. Both had to sweat: 

• On the men’s side, No. 1 seed Houston really, really tried to lose to No. 9 seed Texas A&M. There is always a fine line between grit and collapse in these sorts of games. On one hand, Houston squandered a 12-point lead with two minutes remaining and allowed this to happen as time expired in regulation:

TEXAS A&M AT THE BUZZER TO FORCE OVERTIME

@MarchMadnessMBBpic.twitter.com/d5eFmjqPJp

— The Athletic (@TheAthletic) March 25, 2024

• And then there is the grit, which emerged in the overtime period of the Cougars’ 100-95 win. Is it troubling that one of this tournament’s best teams simply could not put away a decent A&M squad? Or is it impressive that Houston survived four starters fouling out and still advanced to the school’s fifth straight Sweet 16? I think both are true, actually.
  
• On the women’s side, No. 2 seed Stanford nearly went out sad at home to No. 7 seed Iowa State in an 87-81 overtime…