A Selection Committee is a group of people that evaluates applications for a position. This helps to ensure that all aspects of the application are considered, eliminating bias and ensuring diversity in hiring decisions. Selection Committees are common in large companies, but can be used by small businesses as well. When selecting a committee, it’s important to select people from different departments that can offer diverse perspectives and opinions. Ideally, the committee should include employees, peers, and supervisors.
While computer models and the NET are useful tools, committee members rely on hours of personal observations, discussion with coaches, directors of athletics and commissioners, review and comparison of various data and ultimately their own qualitative and quantitative opinions to determine who they will vote for. It is these opinions, combined with a process of scrubbing and re-evaluating the rankings of teams as they play throughout the season, that will determine the final field for the tournament.
The work of the Selection Committee to seed teams starts before the at-large teams are selected, but the two processes often overlap. Some conference tournaments do not end until Selection Sunday, and the committee also has to take into consideration that some teams have already won their conference championships and thus are not eligible for the at-large pool.
During the first part of their work, committee members identify not more than 36 teams that, in their opinion, should be at-large selections (AL) in the tournament based on their play to date. Committee members then use this information, along with the NET and other resources, to evaluate teams’ performances and to formulate an overall ranking of each team. This initial ranking is used as a guide for the subsequent process of evaluating and ranking each team within the at-large pool.
As the rankings are completed, committee members begin scrubbing, or re-evaluating teams’ performance, to affirm true seed accuracy during selection weekend and in the bracket. The process includes taking into account how many games a team has won and lost, its strength of schedule, the quality of its wins and losses and other relevant factors.
Committee members also consider how each team will play in its region and if it would be more advantageous to seed some teams higher than others. This is particularly a concern for teams that have played each other three times or more during the regular season and/or in a conference championship game. The committee tries to avoid placing teams that have already met each other in the same region and at the same site until at least the Sweet 16.
The final step is determining the field, which takes into account whether any at-large team has won its conference championship or otherwise has an advantage over other teams that could replace it if the team was to be removed from the tournament. Once the field is set, the committee will meet on Sunday to reveal it to the public.