The Big Sky Conference men's basketball tournament is the conference championship tournament in men's basketball for the

Big Sky Conference The Big Sky Conference is a List of NCAA conferences, collegiate athletic conference, affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA's NCAA Division I, Division I with college football, football competing in the Football Cha ...

. The event has been held annually since

1976 Events January * January 2 – The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights enters into force. * January 5 – The Pol Pot regime proclaims a new constitution for Democratic Kampuchea. * January 18 – Full diplomatic ...

, the conference's thirteenth year. The tournament winner earns a berth in the NCAA Division I tournament.

Format and host sites

For the Big Sky's first twelve seasons, it did not have a conference tournament. Starting with its fifth season of the regular season champion received a berth in the West regional of the NCAA tournament. an unscheduled tiebreaker playoff was held; the two had identical records (conference & overall) and each had won at home to split the season series; visiting Idaho State prevailed at

Montana Montana ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota to the east, South Dakota to the southeast, Wyoming to the south, an ...

in the Tuesday night playoff. For the tournament's first eight editions (

–

1983 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to TCP/IP is officially completed (this is considered to be the beginning of the ...

), only the top four teams (of eight) in the conference standings participated. The tournament expanded to eight teams in

1984 Events January * January 1 – The Bornean Sultanate of Brunei gains full independence from the United Kingdom, having become a British protectorate in 1888. * January 7 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeas ...

, then scaled back to six in

1989 1989 was a turning point in political history with the "Revolutions of 1989" which ended communism in Eastern Bloc of Europe, starting in Poland and Hungary, with experiments in power-sharing coming to a head with the opening of the Berlin W ...

. Before 2016, when the tournament moved to a predetermined neutral site, it was often hosted by the regular season champion, but not always. If two or more teams tied for the regular season title, all were declared co-champions, but hosting rights were determined by a tiebreaker procedure. The first tournament in which the regular season champion did not host was in

1985 The year 1985 was designated as the International Youth Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 ** The Internet's Domain Name System is created. ** Greenland withdraws from the European Economic Community as a result of a n ...

. Since the 2016 tournament, all full conference members (currently 10) have participated (barring NCAA sanctions or self-imposed postseason bans, the latter of which kept Northern Colorado out of the 2017 tournament), and the tournament is held at a predetermined site. The first such site to host was the Reno Events Center in

Reno, Nevada Reno ( ) is a city in the northwest section of the U.S. state of Nevada, along the Nevada–California border. It is the county seat and most populous city of Washoe County, Nevada, Washoe County. Sitting in the High Eastern Sierra foothills, ...

, which hosted from 2016 to 2018. On September 18, 2017, the Big Sky announced that its men's and women's tournaments would relocate in 2019 to

Boise, Idaho Boise ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of cities in Idaho, most populous city of the U.S. state of Idaho. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, there were 235,685 people residing in the city. Loca ...

; the initial contract runs for three years at

CenturyLink Arena Idaho Central Arena (originally Bank of America Centre, formerly Qwest Arena and CenturyLink Arena) is a multi-purpose arena in the western United States, located in Boise, Idaho. Its seating capacity is 5,002 for ice hockey, 5,300 for basketball ...

, through 2021.

History of the tournament finals

Finals performance by school

* Current members of the Big Sky Conference are highlighted in yellow. * Boise State was a member for 26 years (1970–96), Nevada for 13 years (1979–92), Southern Utah for 10 years (2012-2022). * Charter member Idaho was out of the conference for 18 years (1996–2014).

Broadcasters

Television

Radio

References

External links

* {{NCAA men's college basketball tournament navbox Recurring sporting events established in 1976