The 2025

National Invitation Tournament The National Invitation Tournament (NIT) is an annual men's college basketball tournament operated by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). Since 2023, all rounds of the tournament are played at various sites across the country whi ...

(NIT) was a

single-elimination tournament A single-elimination knockout, or sudden-death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of a match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final match-up, ...

of thirty-two

NCAA Division I NCAA Division I (D-I) is the highest division of intercollegiate athletics sanctioned by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States, which accepts players globally. D-I schools include the major collegiate athlet ...

men's

college basketball College basketball is basketball that is played by teams of Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. In the Higher education in the United States, United States, colleges and universities are governed by collegiate athle ...

teams not selected to participate in the 2025 NCAA tournament. The tournament commenced on March 18th and concluded on April 3rd. The first three rounds were played on campus sites, with the semifinal and final rounds played at

Hinkle Fieldhouse Hinkle Fieldhouse (named Butler Fieldhouse from 1928 until 1966) is a basketball arena on the campus of Butler University in Indianapolis, Indiana. Completed in early 1928, it was the largest basketball arena in the United States until 1950. Th ...

Indianapolis Indianapolis ( ), colloquially known as Indy, is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Indiana, most populous city of the U.S. state of Indiana and the county seat of Marion County, Indiana, Marion ...

. Six programs made their debut in the NIT: Cal State Northridge, Jacksonville State, North Alabama, Northern Colorado, Samford, and UC Riverside. The University of Tennessee–Chattanooga Mocs defeated the University of California–Irvine Anteaters 85–84 in overtime to claim the championship. The All-Tournament Team was composed of Trey Bonham (Chattanooga), Justin Hohn (UC Irvine), Honor Huff (Chattanooga), Devin Tillis (UC Irvine) and Atin Wright (

North Texas North Texas is a term used primarily by residents of the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex to refer to a geographic area of Texas, generally considered to include the area south of Oklahoma, east of Abilene, Texas, Abilene, west of Paris, Texas, Par ...

); Bonham was also selected Most Outstanding Player.

Participants

Teams and pairings for the 2025 NIT were released by the NIT Committee on March 16, 2025. Thirty-two teams qualified for the NIT, including exempt qualifiers, automatic qualifiers, and at-large selections. In

2024 The year saw the list of ongoing armed conflicts, continuation of major armed conflicts, including the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Myanmar civil war (2021–present), Myanmar civil war, the Sudanese civil war (2023–present), Sudane ...

, the

Seton Hall Pirates The Seton Hall Pirates are the intercollegiate athletic sports teams representing Seton Hall University, located in South Orange, New Jersey. The Pirates compete as a member of the NCAA Division I level (non-football sub-level), primarily compet ...

won the NIT championship. Non-NCAA tournament teams from the

Big East The Big East Conference (stylized as BIG EAST) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference that competes in National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA NCAA Division I, Division I in 10 men's sports and 12 women's sports. H ...

Big Ten The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference, among others) is a collegiate athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Faculty Representatives in 1 ...

and

Big 12 The Big 12 Conference is a collegiate athletic conference in the United States. It consists of 16 full-member universities (3 private universities and 13 public universities) in the states of Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Kansas, Ohio, Okla ...

conferences were contractually prohibited from playing in any other postseason tournament, including the NIT, if they declined an invitation or removed themselves from consideration for a bid to the

College Basketball Crown The College Basketball Crown (CBC) is an American men's college basketball tournament promoted by Anschutz Entertainment Group and Fox Sports. The inaugural tournament was held in March and April 2025, at two venues on the Las Vegas Strip in Par ...

Exempt qualifiers

For the 2025 NIT, exempt bids were extended to two teams from the Atlantic Coast (ACC) and Southeastern (SEC) conferences, plus one team each from the top twelve conferences (other than the ACC and SEC) as rated by the

Pomeroy College Basketball Ratings The Pomeroy College Basketball Ratings are a series of predictive ratings of men's college basketball teams published free-of-charge online by Ken Pomeroy. They were first published in 2003. The sports rating system is based on the Pythagorean e ...

(KenPom) on March 16, 2025. The twelve conferences that earned exempt bids based on their KenPom ratings were * American Athletic (AAC, The American) *

Atlantic 10 The Atlantic 10 Conference (A-10) is a collegiate athletic conference whose schools compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's (NCAA) Division I. The A-10's member schools are located mostly on the East Coast and Midwest of the ...

(A–10) *

Big West The Big West Conference (BWC) is an American collegiate athletic conference whose member institutions participate in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's Division I. The conference was originally formed on July 1, 1969, as the Pacific ...

Conference USA Conference USA (CUSA) is a collegiate athletic conference of member institutions in the Southern and Western United States. The conference participates in the NCAA's Division I in all sports. CUSA's offices are located in Dallas, Texas. Mem ...

(CUSA) *

Ivy ''Hedera'', commonly called ivy (plural ivies), is a genus of 12–15 species of evergreen climbing or ground-creeping woody plants in the family Araliaceae, native to Western Europe, Central Europe, Southern Europe, Macaronesia, northwestern ...

* Missouri Valley (MVC) *

Mountain West The Mountain West Conference (MW) is a collegiate athletic conference in the Western United States, participating in NCAA Division I. Its football teams compete in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). The MW officially began operations on Janu ...

(MWC) * West Coast (WCC) *

Western Athletic The Western Athletic Conference (WAC) is an NCAA Division I conference. The WAC covers a broad expanse of the Western United States with member institutions located in Arizona, California, Texas, Utah and Washington. Due to most of the confere ...

(WAC) Whether the twelve exempt-bid conferences ''excluded'' or ''included'' the ACC and SEC is unclear. Multiple sources indicated that there would be sixteen exempt bids extended. This would be possible only if four exempt bids were extended collectively to the ACC and SEC, and twelve other conferences qualified for exempt bids. Nevertheless, two days before NIT selections were to be made, a tweet from the NIT's account included a graphic purporting to show the twelve conferences that were then leading in the KenPom ratings, and those twelve conferences included the ACC and SEC. This would result in only fourteen exempt bids. A

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article in which the tweet was embedded maintained there would be sixteen exempt bids. The two conferences listed above that were excluded from the graphic were the Ivy and the WAC. Because the tweet is the only source indicating there would be only fourteen exempt teams, it may have been erroneous. Further, it appears that Utah Valley, the team entitled to the WAC's exempt bid, could not host due to scheduling issues with their arena, which would mean the WAC did earn an exempt bid. However, local media reporting Utah Valley's NIT bid merely speculated and did not express certainty regarding why they were playing on the road. The Utah Valley athletics website offered no explanation for the team opening the NIT away from home. Without a definitive statement from the NCAA, the status of teams participating in the tournament as either exempt or at large remains unclear. If the WAC did not have an exempt bid, Utah Valley earned an automatic bid, because they were the WAC regular-season champion, did not win the conference tournament, and had a KNIT score better than 125. The teams accepting exempt bids are shown below. No schools from the Big East, Big Ten, Ivy, or SEC accepted invitations, creating five additional at-large berths. The final KNIT (average of Bart Torvik "T-Rank" Ranking (BTR),

ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...

Basketball Power Index (BPI),

Ken Pomeroy Ken Pomeroy is the creator of the college basketball website and statistical archive KenPom. His website includes his College Basketball Ratings, statistics for every NCAA men's Division I basketball team, with archives dating back to the 2002 ...

Rating (KPR), Kevin Pauga Index (KPI),

NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates College athletics in the United States, student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, and Simon Fraser University, 1 in Canada. ...

Evaluation Tool (NET), Strength of Record (SOR) ranking, and Wins Above Bubble (WAB) ranking) scores of non-NCAA tournament teams from conferences that earned exempt bids through the close of play on March 16, 2025 ( Selection Sunday) are summarized in the tables below. Teams in bold accepted a bid; teams in italics were extended an automatic bid but rejected it. Some Big East, Big Ten, and Big 12 teams were contractually obligated to decline.

All exempt qualifiers were given the opportunity to host first-round games.

Automatic qualifiers

Additionally, automatic bids were given to regular-season conference champions with an average ranking (or "KNIT" score) of 125 or better across the

BTR BTR may refer to: Arts and entertainment Music * B.T.R. (band), a Bulgarian rock band * Bad Trip Records, an American record label * Beyond Therapy Records, an American industrial music record label * Big Tent Revival, a Christian rock band * Big T ...

, BPI, KPR, KPI,

NET NET may refer to: Broadcast media United States * National Educational Television, the predecessor of the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) in the United States * National Empowerment Television, a politically conservative cable TV network ...

SOR Sor or SOR may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * School of Rock, 2003 film starring Jack Black * Shades of Rhythm, a British based rave music group * Son of Rambow, 2008 film starring Bill Milner and Will Poulter * Sor, Serdar Ortaç ...

and WAB rankings. The final KNIT scores through the close of play on March 16, 2025 (Selection Sunday), of teams that were conference regular-season champions, failed to win their conference tournament and are not from conferences receiving an exempt bid are summarized in the table below.

Teams qualifying for and accepting automatic bids were as follows:

At-large bids

The following teams were awarded

at-large bids At large (''before a noun'': at-large) is a description for members of a governing body who are elected or appointed to represent a whole membership or population (notably a city, county, state, province, nation, club or association), rather tha ...

The NCAA caused confusion on Selection Sunday, by failing to communicate with at least one program invited to the NIT prior to the initial release of the bracket. Instead, it appears the NCAA assumed that

mid-major Mid-major conferences in American college sports at the NCAA Division I level are athletic conferences that are not among the power conferences. The grouping is most commonly used in men's college basketball to describe conferences outside of the ...

schools would not decline an NIT bid. UC Riverside had already confirmed their participation in the 2025 College Basketball Invitational, before learning they had been invited to the NIT. For a brief time, NIT and CBI brackets co-existed showing UC Riverside playing in both tournaments. Participation in multiple postseason tournaments is not permitted under NCAA rules. After UC Riverside's commitment to play in the CBI came to the attention of the NCAA, instead of communicating with UC Riverside, they contacted South Alabama, the top remaining at-large team, and extended an NIT invitation to them. As the NCAA was communicating with South Alabama, UC Riverside was in contact with CBI organizers to decline their invitation to that tournament, so they could play in the NIT. After their commitment to the CBI was dissolved, UC Riverside contacted the NCAA and accepted their bid to the NIT. Just an hour after extending the invitation, the NCAA contacted South Alabama and informed them their bid to the NIT had been revoked.

Declined bids

Teams contractually obligated to decline

Teams from the Big East, Big Ten and Big 12 conferences that were offered a bid or preemptively declined the opportunity to play in the

2025 College Basketball Crown The 2025 College Basketball Crown (CBC) was a Single-elimination tournament, single-elimination, fully-Bracket (tournament), bracketed men's college basketball postseason tournament featuring sixteen National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCA ...

were thereby contractually forbidden from playing in the NIT. Teams that fulfilled their obligations to decline were: *

Arizona State Arizona State University (Arizona State or ASU) is a public research university in Tempe, Arizona, United States. Founded in 1885 as Territorial Normal School by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, the university is one of the largest ...

Butler A butler is a person who works in a house serving and is a domestic worker in a large household. In great houses, the household is sometimes divided into departments, with the butler in charge of the dining room, wine cellar, and pantries, pantr ...

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ; colloquially nicknamed Cincy) is a city in Hamilton County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. Settled in 1788, the city is located on the northern side of the confluence of the Licking River (Kentucky), Licking and Ohio Ri ...

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

* DePaul * Georgetown *

Indiana Indiana ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Michigan to the northwest, Michigan to the north and northeast, Ohio to the east, the Ohio River and Kentucky to the s ...

Iowa Iowa ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the upper Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west; Wisconsin to the northeast, Ill ...

Kansas State Kansas State University (KSU, Kansas State, or K-State) is a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Manhattan, Kansas, United States. It was opened as the state's land-grant college in 1863 and was the first public inst ...

Nebraska Nebraska ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Ka ...

* Northwestern *

Ohio State The Ohio State University (Ohio State or OSU) is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio, United States. A member of the University System of Ohio, it was founded in 1870. It is one of the largest universities by enrollme ...

Penn State #Redirect Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a Public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related Land-grant university, land-grant research university with ca ...

Rutgers Rutgers University ( ), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of three campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College and was aff ...

TCU TCU may stand for: Education * Tanzania Commission for Universities, regulatory body for Universities in Tanzania * Texas Christian University, a private university in Fort Worth, Texas ** TCU Horned Frogs, the athletic programs of the school * Tok ...

* UCF *

USC USC may refer to: Education United States * Universidad del Sagrado Corazón, Santurce, Puerto Rico * University of South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina ** University of South Carolina System, a state university system of South Carolina * ...

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

* Villanova *

West Virginia West Virginia is a mountainous U.S. state, state in the Southern United States, Southern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States.The United States Census Bureau, Census Bureau and the Association of American ...

Other teams declining bids

Boise State Boise State University (BSU) is a public research university in Boise, Idaho, United States. Founded in 1932 by the Episcopal Church, it became an independent junior college in 1934 and has been awarding baccalaureate and master's degrees It ...

Florida State Florida State University (FSU or Florida State) is a Public university, public research university in Tallahassee, Florida, United States. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida and a preeminent university in the s ...

LSU Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College, commonly referred to as Louisiana State University (LSU), is an American Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Baton Rouge, Louis ...

Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario to the north and east and by the U.S. states of Wisconsin to the east, Iowa to the so ...

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, and its county seat. It is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, second-most populous city in Pennsylvania (after Philadelphia) and the List of Un ...

Providence Providence often refers to: * Providentia, the divine personification of foresight in ancient Roman religion * Divine providence, divinely ordained events and outcomes in some religions * Providence, Rhode Island, the capital of Rhode Island in the ...

Seton Hall Seton Hall University (SHU) is a Private university, private Catholic Church, Catholic research university in South Orange, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1856 by then-Bishop James Roosevelt Bayley and named after his aunt, Saint Elizab ...

South Carolina South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...

UNLV The University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) is a public land-grant research university in Paradise, Nevada, United States. The campus is about east of the Las Vegas Strip. It was formerly part of the University of Nevada from 1957 to 1969. ...

* Wake Forest *

Washington Washington most commonly refers to: * George Washington (1732–1799), the first president of the United States * Washington (state), a state in the Pacific Northwest of the United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A ...

Participated in 2025 College Basketball Crown.

Ivy League teams

As described in detail

above Above may refer to: *Above (artist) Tavar Zawacki (b. 1981, California) is a Polish, Portuguese - American abstract artist and internationally recognized visual artist based in Berlin, Germany. From 1996 to 2016, he created work under the ...

, it is unclear whether the Ivy League was an exempt-bid conference. If it was, all seven of its non-NCAA tournament teams declined bids to the NIT, since no Ivy League teams participated.

Field synopsis

Rankings, ratings and records were through March 16, 2025 Selection Sunday and prior to any additional post-season activity. This also includes a "KNIT" score, which is leveraged as a criteria and evaluation tool for the

selection committee; it average of the following seven metrics, then ranks based on the results: * BTR: Bart Torvik "T-Rank" Ranking * BPI:

Basketball Power Index * KPR: Ken Pomeroy College Basketball Ratings (aka "KenPom") * KPI: Kevin Pauga Index * NET: NCAA Evaluation Tool * SOR: Strength Of Record, as calculated by ESPN * WAB: Wins Above Bubble, as calculated by Bart Torvik

Bracket

All seeded teams hosted their first-round games, except for Dayton, because the

First Four The First Four is a play-in round of the NCAA Division I men's and women's basketball tournaments. It consists of two games contested between the four lowest-ranked teams in the field (usually the four lowest-ranked conference champions), an ...

of the 2025 NCAA tournament was played on their home court. Dayton had another scheduling conflict with their arena and consequently played their second-round game on the road as well. All other second-round games were hosted by the higher seeded team. Seeded teams playing unseeded opponents hosted quarterfinal games. Hosts of other quarterfinal games are noted in the brackets below.

Dallas Region

;Note

Irvine Region

San Francisco Region

;Note

Dayton Region

;Notes

Semifinals and final

Game summaries

:''All times are in

Eastern Daylight Time The Eastern Time Zone (ET) is a time zone encompassing part or all of 23 states in the eastern part of the United States, parts of eastern Canada, and the state of Quintana Roo in Mexico. * Eastern Standard Time (EST) is five hours behin ...

( UTC-4)''

First round

Second round

Quarterfinals

Semifinals

Final

Quality of participating teams compared with College Basketball Crown

Media

ESPN, Inc. has exclusive rights to all of the NIT games. It telecasts every game across

ESPN2 ESPN2 is an American multinational pay television network owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between the Walt Disney Company (which owns a controlling 80% stake) and Hearst Communications (which owns the remaining 20%). ESPN2 was initially ...

ESPNU ESPNU is an American multinational digital cable and satellite sports television channel owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between the Walt Disney Company (which owns a controlling 80% stake) and Hearst Communications (which owns the remain ...

ESPN3 ESPN3 (formerly ESPN360 and ESPN3.com) is an internet, online streaming media, streaming service owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between the Walt Disney Company (which operates the network, through its 80% controlling ownership interest) an ...

, and

ESPN+ ESPN+ is an American over-the-top subscription video streaming service available in the United States, owned by ESPN Inc., which is a joint venture between the Walt Disney Company (which owns a controlling 80% stake) and Hearst Communicati ...

Westwood One Westwood One, Inc. is an American radio network owned by Cumulus Media. The company syndicates talk, music, and sports programming. The company takes its name from an earlier network also named Westwood One, a company founded in 1976. The co ...

has exclusive radio rights to the semifinals and the championship.

References

{{2025 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament navbox National Invitation Tournament National Invitation

College basketball tournaments in Indiana Basketball competitions in Indianapolis