The History of D.II to D.I NCAAB Transitioning

When a college elects to make the transition from Division II to Division I, the program is forced to enter into what the NCAA calls a “reclassification period”. The period is four years in which the college is ineligible to compete for an NCAA championship, as they complete their transition. The period time-length used to be just two seasons, however there were numerous issues with teams maintaining the standards set by the NCAA. This caused the NCAA to up the transitioning period from two years to four years.

According to the ASUN Commissioner, Ted Gumbart, “Part of the rationale at the time that change went into effect was that the schools that were moving into Division I were the ones having the greatest number of compliance issues, violations and ineligible student athletes; it just seemed that the transition was not comprehensive enough to bring the school up to the level of oversight necessary. The two-year process was not sufficient”. 

Bellarmine basketball is in just their second year of the transition period, so they will not be eligible to participate in March Madness until the 2024-2025 season. This means that although Bellarmine has won the ASUN conference tournament, they will not be dancing.

The ASUN Championship Recap

While the Bellarmine Knights are not eligible to compete in March Madness, they were able to compete in the ASUN Tournament and they had a great showing at home to beat Jacksonville 77-72 to win the title. Led by 6’0” senior guard, CJ Fleming, and 6’3” senior guard, Dylan Penn, the Knights nearly shot 50/40/90 as a team in the championship game. Bellarmine shot 50% (25/50) from the field, 48% (12/25) from beyond the arc, and 88.2% (15/17) from the free-throw line.

Fleming scored a career-high 27 points, including going 11/11 from the free-throw line and Penn recorded an impressive 22/6/4 line. The senior guard duo combined for 63.6% of Bellarmine’s points and looked nearly unstoppable. For the Jacksonville Dolphins, Jordan Davis dropped 22 points on 8/14 shooting, but it was not enough to overcome the Knights on their home court. 

So… Who Gets the ASUN Auto-Bid?

Going into the title game, Jacksonville knew they controlled their own fate. Bellarmine, on the other hand, not only controlled their fate for the ASUN Tournament Championship, but they also controlled Jacksonville State’s fate on whether or not they got the nod for March Madness. In the event that a conference tournament winner is ineligible for the big tournament, the automatic qualifying bid for the conference goes to the regular season conference champion (in this case the Jacksonville State Gamecocks).

Jacksonville State was upset in the semifinals by none-other-than the Jacksonville Dolphins, when they beat JSU 54-51. Despite this, JSU went 13-3 in the ASUN regular season and were the #1 overall seed, compared to Jacksonville’s 11-5 ASUN record (and #2 seed). This meant that when the clock in the ASUN Championship dwindled down to 0.0 and the Bellarmine Knights won their first ever D.I title, it was Jacksonville State who were handed the automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. The Gamecocks are led by 6’3” guard, Darian Adams, and currently listed as a projected #15 seed in Joe Lunardi’s most recent bracketology.