The ASUN Conference men's basketball tournament (formerly known as the Trans America Athletic Conference men's basketball tournament between 1979 and 2001) is the conference championship tournament in

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...

for the

ASUN Conference The Atlantic Sun Conference (ASUN) is a collegiate athletic conference operating mostly in the Southeastern United States. The league participates at the NCAA Division I level, and began sponsoring football at the Division I FCS level in 2022. ...

, formerly known as the Trans America Athletic Conference (TAAC) and Atlantic Sun Conference. The tournament has been held every year since 1979, except for 1992–93. It is 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, ...

and seeding is based on regular season records. The winner, declared conference champion, receives the conference's automatic bid to the NCAA men's basketball tournament, as long as it is eligible for NCAA-sponsored postseason play. The eligibility issue applied in both 2021 and 2022, with each final featuring a team representing a transitional member of Division I ( North Alabama in 2021 and Bellarmine in 2022). Under NCAA rules, a school transitioning from

NCAA Division II NCAA Division II (D-II) is the intermediate-level division of competition in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). It offers an alternative to both the larger and better-funded Division I and to the scholarship-free environment ...

is not eligible for NCAA-sponsored D-I postseason play (either the NCAA tournament or the NIT) during its four-year transitional period."Why Merrimack must sit out March Madness in its historic season and is in first place in its conference"
''CBS Sports''. Retrieved 2022-03-08. North Alabama began its transition in July 2018 and was thus ineligible for the NCAA tournament or NIT through the 2021–22 season; Bellarmine began its transition in July 2020 and is thus ineligible for said events through 2023–24. Should a transitional school win the tournament, ASUN rules call for the regular-season champion to receive the automatic bid. North Alabama lost its final, making the issue moot for 2021, but Bellarmine won in 2022, giving Jacksonville State that season's automatic bid. The Atlantic Sun tournament is the earliest of the NCAA Division I men's tournaments and its champion is the first to lock in an NCAA bid.

History

Trans America Athletic Conference

Atlantic Sun/ASUN Conference

Broadcasters

Performance by school

''Teams in bold are ASUN members as of the upcoming 2024–25 NCAA basketball season.'' * Among other current ASUN members: ** Austin Peay,

Jacksonville Jacksonville ( ) is the most populous city proper in the U.S. state of Florida, located on the Atlantic coast of North Florida, northeastern Florida. It is the county seat of Duval County, Florida, Duval County, with which the City of Jacksonv ...

and North Alabama have advanced to the tournament final but have yet to win a championship. **

Central Arkansas Central Arkansas, also known as the Little Rock metro, designated by the United States Office of Management and Budget as the Little Rock-North Little Rock-Conway Metropolitan Statistical Area, is the most populous metro area in the U.S. state ...

and Eastern Kentucky have yet to advance to the tournament final. ** West Georgia will play its first ASUN season in 2024–25.

Footnotes

References

{{NCAA men's college basketball tournament navbox Recurring sporting events established in 1979