The Big Dance isn’t always an open floor

Everything is skewed and tilted and teetered toward the power conferences and, because of it, the state of Utah stands to get mid-major(ly) ripped off.

It’s outrageous, it’s biased, it’s unfair. It may even be a monopoly.

Oh well, that’s college . . . basketball.

Utah football went 12-0 last season and didn’t get a chance to play for the national title because of a system many have called rigged, un-American and anti-trustworthy.

After Utah got “relegated” to the Sugar Bowl, where it rolled Alabama to finish No. 2 in the final Associated Press poll, the Mountain West Conference went on a crusade to overturn the Bowl Championships Series.

There are bills rumbling through Congress right now trying to abolish the BCS.

And though none of them will succeed, it’s the thought that counts.

Meanwhile, in basketball, Utah State recently swept to the Western Athletic Conference regular-season crown. The Aggies enter this week’s conference tournament in Reno with 27 wins and a Ratings Percentage Index (RPI) power rating in the 20s.

Yet, the Aggies are being told by some bracketologists they must win the WAC tournament to earn an NCAA bid.

The argument is the Aggies simply have not done enough to warrant one of 34 at-large berths. Their strength of schedule ranking of 135 sticks out like the Wasatch. Another problem: all those games and all you’ve got to show for it is a quality win over Utah?

Of course, when Hawaii’s football team came out of the WAC to earn automatic access into a BCS bowl game two years ago, the Warriors had an SOS of 111 out of 119 schools.

But the BCS didn’t hold that against Honolulu.

Stick this nugget in your bracket: Utah State could win 29 games and not make the NCAA tournament.

The Aggies’ ultimate at-large fate is in the responsible hands of 10 NCAA selection committee members.

Better those hands, no doubt, than voting jokesters in the USA Today coaches’ poll.

I called WAC Commissioner Karl Benson on Tuesday to half-jokingly wonder whether he was prepared to sue the NCAA if Utah State, should it fail to win the WAC tournament, gets snubbed of an at-large berth.

Benson is a former NCAA tournament committee member.

Me, I’m a wise guy.

Benson, back in the mid-1990s, led the “little-guy” revolt against upper crust college football and used the threat-of-lawsuit stick to help secure improved BCS bowl access to non-BCS conferences.

No, Benson said, there would be no lawsuit, but then he made an at-large case for Utah State that sounded similar to the one people made for Utah in football.

“You put those credentials on the board without the name of the team attached to it and one would think they’re a legitimate at-large selection,” Benson said of Utah State.

This is not a pro-BCS rant. It’s a bird-cage liner to point out football isn’t being run by Commissioner Satan and the NCAA tournament isn’t as fair as you might think.

Basketball is more equitable than football, by a Stephen Curry long shot, but it is not without its flaws. And too bad Curry won’t play in this year’s tournament because Davidson won only 26 games.

“Absolutely, it is not a perfect science,” Benson admitted.

For starters, the best 65 schools do not make the NCAA tournament.

You knew that, right?

Schools such as Utah State and St. Mary’s and Davidson are excluded at the expense of conference champions who would finish dead last in some leagues.

Chattanooga (18-16) had a losing record until it clinched an automatic bid by sweeping through the Southern Conference tournament.

That’s not a knock -- that’s what makes the tournament fun. But it’s also a reason why No. 1 is 96-0 against No. 16 since the tournament was expanded in 1985.

Otherwise worthy mid-major schools are also bounced off the bubble by sixth-, seventh- and eight-place finishers from the six power conferences.

Georgetown, out of the rugged Big East, probably would have received an at-large bid had it finished 8-10 in conference instead of 7-11.

And former CBS analyst Billy Packer would have argued for Georgetown at 7-11.

The debate in the selection committee, Benson says, is whether you reward the most talented 34 at-large schools or teams that earned the right to be there.

They are not necessarily the same.

With star guard Patrick Mills back in the lineup after an injury, St. Mary’s appeared a lock for an at-large bid until the Gaels, with Mills back in the lineup Monday night, got blown off the court by Gonzaga in the West Coast Conference title game.

That must have left tournament selectors scratching their heads.

Now what: hello NIT?

People love magical mid-major tales, but this year the story lines are getting slimmer by the minute -- and that’s too bad.

George Mason, remember, was an at-large pick out of the Colonial Athletic Assn. in 2006 when it made its at-huge run to the Final Four.

This year, power conferences might devour 28 to 30 of the available 34 at-large bids, leaving table scraps to the Mountain West and the Atlantic 10.

Utah State, if it doesn’t win the WAC tournament, will be measured against some .500 team from the Big Wig -- and probably lose.

A surprise run to a conference tournament title by an unsuspecting interloper -- remember Georgia last year in the Southeastern? -- can also doom an otherwise deserving mid-major.

Is that, like, fair?

Or is that, like, football?

“The NCAA [selection process] certainly has more sunshine on it, there’s more accountability in the NCAA process,” Benson said. “I’ve had times when I thought WAC teams should get in, but I also understand the process provided them. The outcome might not appear fair, but they received a fair evaluation. . . . That’s maybe what keeps people from threatening lawsuits or going to Congress.”

Utah State, we just know it, is going to win that “biggest little WAC tournament” over in Reno and remove all this silly at-large doubt.

If not, Benson says, “I know they’ll get their fair shake.”

If not, someone in Logan can always shake down a congressman.

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chris.dufresne@latimes.com

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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

THE TIMES’ TOP 25

Chris Dufresne’s rankings and comments:

Rk.; Team (Rec.); Comment (last week)

1 MEMPHIS

28-3 Not every pollster is afraid of putting the Tigers on top. (3)

2 N.ORTH CAROLINA

27-3 (“Psssst . . . you guys are really No.1 . . . just don’t tell Calipari.” (4)

3 LOUISVILLE

25-5 Rankman confused. Team won Big East but trails two Big East schools in AP rankings? (6)

4 PITTSBURGH

28-3 If only Panthers could play UConn six times in the NCAA tournament. (5)

5 CONNECTICUT

27-3 Check out women’s team if interested in top-ranked hoops on campus. (1)

6 OKLAHOMA

27-4 Griffin may purchase Rhode Island to store his post-season trophies. (2)

7 MICHIGAN ST.ATE

25-5 Won Big Ten title despite player being slowed by “traveling” pneumonia. (8)

8 WAKE FOREST

24-5 Probably would have dominated the other ACC (Argentina Coast Conference). (10)

9 DUKE

25-6 Bad news Dookies: Virginia Commonwealth is back in the NCAA tournament. (7)

10 VILLANOVA

25-6 Campus astronomer says he has discovered a Villa-super-nova. (11)

11 KANSAS

25-6 Team has only enough strength left to make a “walk” toward another NCAA title. (9)

12 WASHINGTON

24-7 Bumper sticker for 1953 league championship team was “I Like Pike.” (16)

13 GONZAGA

26-5 It was almost sinful what Zags did to Saint. Mary’s in WCC title game. (13)

14 MISSOURI

25-6 Hates being this close to UCLA in rankings (because of Tyus Edney). (14)

15 UCLA

24-7 Hoping for a No. 3 NCAA tournament seeding and a lift to the airport. (20)

16 XAVIER

24-6 Scheduling snafu lands team in quarterfinals of World Baseball Classic. (17)

17 CLEMSON

23-7 Tigers started the year 16-0 before doing what they’ve done since then. (19)

18 SYRACUSE

23-8 Boeheim trying to shake moniker “best coach who insists on living in Syracuse.” (24)

19 PURDUE

22-9 Rankman selection committee still not sure what to make of the Boilermakers. (22)

20 ARIZONA ST.ATE

22-8 Beating Arizona in Pac-10 tourney could knock rivals out of NCAAs. (18)

21 BUTLER

26-5 Time to gather at Hinkle Fieldhouse for annual screening of “Hoosiers.” (23)

22 FLORIDA STATE

23-8 NCAA probation may force school to vacate this week’s No. 22 AP ranking. (25)

23 LOUISIANA ST.ATE

25-6 Best team in the SEC could be in for short NCAA hayride. (15)

24 MARQUETTE

23-8 Entering NCAA tournament with its guard down (Dominic James). (12)

25 ILLINOIS

23-8 Rumor of team dropping out of Rankman’s poll was just Illi-noise. (21)