by Abe Sauer

It is once again time for the NCAA “March Madness” basketball tournament. The eventual champions will get to bask in the national spotlight until the next cruise-ship disaster/shark attack/episode of “Girls”/baseball season/ happens. And sure, winning a basketball title is worth bragging about; but we all know the real champion is the institution of higher education that can charge the most tuition and still have enough students to keep its rejection letter printer warm. It’s The Awl’s annual NCAA bracket by tuition, using the college information resource Peterson’s.* (Where available, in-state tuition was used.)

Congratulations to Bucknell, an easy champion with annual tuition of $45,132, or about the cost of all four years at either UCLA or the University of Illinois. (If we were running this for lowest tuition, the award would go to the North Carolina A&T; State University, in Greensboro, coming in at a whopping $2,791.)

*Due to missing data at Peterson’s, Collegedata.com tuitions were used for LIU-Brooklyn and San Diego State Univ.

Previously:

• 2012 March Tuition Madne$$ Champ Georgetown ($40,920)

• 2010 March Tuition Madne$$ Champ Richmond ($40,010)

• 2009 March Tuition Madne$$ Champ: Wake Forest ($38,622)

Abe Sauer is the author of How to be: NORTH DAKOTA.