NCAA Tournament: Basketball competition or huge money machine?

The NCAA tournament has sent brackets into chaos this year. Upset after upset has knocked off clear-cut favorites such as Kansas and Kentucky. But the surprise upsets haven’t been the only madness raging this March. The tournament is the pinnacle of college basketball. It’s about athletic competition and basketball glory. It’s about the players and their dream of hoisting up that NCAA trophy. Oh yeah, and it’s also maybe a little about money.

If you’ve been watching the games these past couple weeks, you might have noticed a lot of Reese’s candy. And not just the ones you’ve been putting in your mouth. With ads on the actual arena floors during conference tournaments and the bottom of the giant scoreboard at Madison Square Garden, the candy maker has taken branding to a new level.

Just in case you can’t afford a pricey ticket ($240.50 on average for a Stubhub ticket, and that’s just for the first and second rounds) to see these logos in person, Reese’s, “an official partner of the NCAA," is coming to your TV. Prying on the grumbling stomachs of TV viewers, the peanut butter and chocolate candy appears in a series of commercials, specialized for each round of the tournament.

Check out a description of all of Reese’s tournament advertising

The cost for the Reese’s invasion? Not cheap. Reese’s deal with the Big East Conference men’s and women’s basketball tournaments alone sits at six figures, according to Street and Smith’s Sports Business Journal.

On the surface, Reese’s candy doesn’t really have a whole lot to do with basketball. But the kind of exposure the NCAA tournament brings is priceless. At least a Reese’s has the same colors as a basketball, right?

We’re used to seeing advertisers spend big money for the national attention brought by major sporting events. Just look at the Super Bowl. But the millions the conferences receive from advertising deals are just a starting point. The conferences that are lucky enough to send teams to the NCAA tournament have the chance to pocket many millions more.

Each tournament game is worth $222,206 to the conference of the winning team. But those winnings are on a per-year basis for six years. So really, over $1 million is on the line for every tournament game. Try thinking about that when you’re shooting free throws with 0.5 seconds left.

The Big East Conference flooded the bracket with eight teams, but it saw its chances for profit drop considerably when three of its teams lost the very first day of the tournament. The price tag for Notre Dame, Marquette, and Georgetown’s losses came in at almost $4 million.

Read about the Big East’s losses

But don’t worry too much about the Big East. The conference guaranteed itself a check of at least $5,332, 944 after West Virginia University secured its spot in the Final Four on Saturday night. So one of the four eager teams remaining in the tournament will take home a fancy ring and all the glory the college basketball world has to offer. But the real winners of March Madness may be the ones who are taking home the checks: the conferences.

--Brooke Sutherland