The bracket below is our college basketball model’s best prediction of what the 2020 NIT bracket will look like at the end of the season. It is not a reflection of what the bracket would look like if the season ended today. For a full explanation of how the model works, read this: How Our College Basketball Model Works. Otherwise, here’s the short version:

Our model simulates the season 4,000 times, measures out each team’s median overall seed across the simulations, then puts those seeds in order to create a seed list. It measures the most likely “cut line” between the NCAA Tournament and the NIT, taking into account the likelihood of “bid thieves” (teams who would not receive an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament but win their conference tournament over an at-large bid team, thereby shrinking the number of at-large bids available). It measures the median number of NIT automatic bids (teams that win their conference’s regular season title but don’t receive a bid to the NCAA Tournament, automatic or at-large, receive an automatic bid to the NIT) and assigns those bids to the most likely teams to receive them (limiting each conference to one automatic bid, of course). It then constructs a bracket.

Because of bid thieves and automatic bids, there will be some teams who appear both in this NIT Bracketology and in our NCAAT Bracketology.

If you would like to see how likely our model views every team to make and/or win either the NCAAT or the NIT, you can do so on our College Basketball Probabilities page.

If you notice any irregularities or have questions of any sort, please contact me through the information available on our about page or on twitter: @joestunardi.

The winner of the first region listed plays the winner of the second in the Final Four.

Automatic bids are marked with a single asterisk (*).

When this bracket updates, it’s usually done around the middle of the day. Updates are now happening daily.

Last updated Thursday, March 12th (Current through games of 3/11)

Purdue Region

1. Purdue 8. Radford* 4. Notre Dame 5. Alabama 3. Memphis 6. Georgetown 2. Mississippi State 7. North Texas*

North Carolina State Region

1. North Carolina State 8. North Carolina Central* 4. South Carolina 5. St. John’s 3. Texas 6. Furman 2. Stanford 7. Eastern Washington*

Arkansas Region

1. Arkansas 8. Arkansas-Little Rock* 4. UCLA 5. UConn 3. Oklahoma State 6. Tulsa 2. Rhode Island 7. Colgate*

Saint Louis Region