North Carolina's AD had no business chairing this committee
UNC AD Bubba Cunningham was the committee chair. The Tar Heels were the last team in. Who could have seen that coming?
Let’s turn to the Fourth Estate, which, for all of the attacks it is under these days, still serves as an arbiter for fair play.
When it comes to conflicts of interest, The New York Times’ handbook on ethical journalism makes five different references to real “or apparent” conflicts of interests, which is a catch-all way of saying that a journalist, even with the best of intentions, should avoid any impression that he or she is favoriting a subject or stance.
The Society of Professional Journalists says journalists should “avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived.”
The now-defunct American Society of News Editors (ASNE)? Even more direct:
“Journalists must avoid impropriety and the appearance of impropriety as well as any conflict of interest or the appearance of conflict. They should neither accept anything nor pursue any activity that might compromise or seem to compromise their integrity.”
Selecting 68 teams for a basketball tournament isn’t journalism. Let’s make that much clear.
But if we were to hold the NCAA Division I men’s basketball committee to the same standards that journalists are held to, we’d wonder how on God’s green earth the chair of said committee ended up being the athletic director of a school whose team is a March staple.
Then, we would lose our collective minds when said team — which by every objective metric was on the wrong side of the tournament bubble — ended up being the last team to make the field.