Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College basketball

It appears about 14 years ago there was an attempt to create a standardization for the infoboxes regarding tournament achievements, and while that seemed to mostly resolve things, there is still one issue prevalent throughout many college basketball pages. There is an inconsistency regarding the round of 32. Most pages include round of 32 appearances, but some do not, and I have been trying to add round of 32 appearances to these remaining pages, but have received pushback from editors who take care of those specific pages. Their pushback offers a logical argument though, as in some cases, including the round of 32 creates a visually "awkward" situation, as some schools have more Sweet 16 appearances than round of 32 due to the true round of 32 having only existed since 1979. With that, I would argue, is counting round of 32 appearances really that necessary? Aside from smaller "Cinderella" schools, making the second round isn't viewed as much of an accomplishment, and instead, the goal for many is to at least make the second weekend of the tournament (Sweet 16). Perhaps the one exemption could be to keep the round of 32 appearances for teams that have only made it that far in their history. Would like to try and find a consensus for standardization among all pages. Red0ctober22 (talk) 03:05, 23 March 2025 (UTC)

:Red0ctober22, to clarify, we are talking about Template:Infobox college basketball team, as seen at Duke Blue Devils men's basketball. The fields listing every single year of every round of advancement through the NCAA tourney plus every single year of conference tourney and regular season championships really seems like overkill for an infobox. I can see listing out the individual years for national titles, but everything else should probably just be a simple count. The body of these basketball program articles can included details listed of yearly championships and tourney advancement. Jweiss11 (talk) 18:02, 24 March 2025 (UTC)

::I think the conference regular season and tournament championship years are helpful, especially with programs less successful than Duke. Aside from national championship years, I would also support the inclusion of natty runner-up years and probably even Final Four. I can see an argument being made for schools that have only went as far as, say a couple Sweet Sixteen appearances, to include those as an exception. However, dozens and dozens of NCAA tournament berths look terrible as is. JTtheOG (talk) 18:11, 24 March 2025 (UTC)

:::I agree that it's absolutely visually unappealing to look at the "barrage" of years on infoboxes for teams like Duke and Kentucky. I propose this: list the years for every championship, those being conference tournament and regular season championships, national championships, and even Final Four appearances (those are considered regional championships). Then the rest can be just listed in a number as you said, like "NCAA Tournament appearances: 40" or something like that. I understand for smaller schools it may look like nothing, but most smaller schools that have a tournament appearances at least have a conference regular season or conference tournament championship. Obviously this would be a big undertaking and would need the infobox itself to be changed, but it would definitely clear things up.

:::This would model the NBA infoboxes really (see Philadelphia 76ers), as they only list the years for NBA titles, conference titles, and division titles, it's not noted if you just make the playoffs one year without winning anything. Red0ctober22 (talk) 18:22, 24 March 2025 (UTC)

::::A minor change to this, instead of having to tweak the infobox coding, I would say that simply removing national runner-up (because that already counts in Final Four), Elite 8, Sweet 16, and Round of 32 appearances could suffice. Then even the best programs like Duke or Kentucky would only really have only one entry with a large number of years (NCAA Tournament appearances). Red0ctober22 (talk) 03:04, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

:I think the compromise for WP editors who are averse to prose is to have the tourney details in a table like at {{section link|Texas_Tech_Red_Raiders_basketball#Postseason}} (and even that could maybe be reduced to final finish result). A slew of years that aren't even linked is just clutter saying "they made it a bunch of times" for boosterism and a type of participation award. Limiting the infobox to regular season conf and conf tourney titles along with national titles and Final Fours seems discriminate. —Bagumba (talk) 03:14, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

::I think that sounds like a good proposal, and most pages already have that table that shows specific tournament details which helps. I will give this some time to see if anyone objects before starting to clean up any infoboxes. Red0ctober22 (talk) 04:14, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

:::Since there is not any opposition, I will move forward with cleaning up the infoboxes. I will wait though until the NCAA tournament is over because traffic on individual team pages will likely drop off after that.

:::Moving forward, the standard it seems we have agreed upon is to only include: NCAA Tournament championships (and the two pre-tournament Premo-Poretta and Helms championships, if-applicable), national runner-up, Final Four appearances, conference tournament championships, conference regular season championships, and Conference division championships. Anything else can be removed.

:::This will also allow for a standardization for these years to be linked, as the NCAA tournament championships and runner-ups can be linked to that year's championship game, the Final Four appearances can be linked to that year's tournament, and the conference tournament championship's can be linked to that year's conference tournament. Red0ctober22 (talk) 18:50, 30 March 2025 (UTC)

::::There should be movement to remove the entire parameter from the template page as well. So that in the future, they won't be recreated.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 00:46, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::Yes, I'd suggest updating the {{tl|Infobox college basketball team}} template itself. Afterwards, cleaning up the individual pages is not urgent as a purely cosmetic change. —Bagumba (talk) 04:58, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::That sounds like a great idea, although I fear that might mess up the coding for the template on every single page though? Red0ctober22 (talk) 21:49, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::Essentially, I would still have to remove, for example "| NCAAsweetsixteen = 2009, 2016, 2018, 2021, 2022" from each individual page, correct? Red0ctober22 (talk) 21:50, 2 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::This isn't related to this current branch of the Infobox standardization discussion, but I think the "| NCAAeliteeight" line of the template should be kept because that is the smallest size the tournament has ever been and as a result, you can't have instances of teams having more final four appearances than elite eights (like you can with elite eights vs sweet sixteens and sweet sixteens vs round of 32 appearances) in their respective infoboxes. Additionally, you'd have the smallest NCAA tournament size being eight teams as reasoning behind that being the infobox cutoff (while removing sweet 16s, round of 32s, etc.) instead of just an arbitrary discussion deciding on Final Fours or better. I agree on everything else that has been discussed except the removal of "| NCAAeliteeight" from the template. TNNSUH (talk) 03:11, 14 April 2025 (UTC)

::::As a fan of college basketball who uses wikipedia for information when watching random games I really loved having the progression of each round listed. I don't necessarily need it where it was if you are trying to make the front page less cluttered, but maybe having it listed under the postseason section would be good? I liked the shrinking list of years because it made it easy to see performance over the time and fun quirks like being really good or bad in specific rounds. Andreww2003 (talk) 14:48, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

::::Count me in as opposition. I referenced the data in those infoboxes all the time when researching programs. Rounds advanced to in the tournament is a major milestone when looking at programs, and having them in a convenient, standardized, and prominent place was a big benefit when referencing the pages. The "barrage" for prominent teams like Kentucky and Duke actually seems like more of a feature than a bug, as it emphasizes just exactly why those programs are considered blue bloods. WallyOPD (talk) 15:00, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::Very poor decision in my humble opinion 2600:6C40:4AF0:770:B0E1:8558:7103:3EAE (talk) 15:12, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::I agree. Tournament advancement in College Basketball is a significant milestone, especially for mid-majors who make it to a Sweet 16 or Elite 8. They should be included in the info box. 131.204.107.52 (talk) 15:22, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

:::I am in agreement, it's just too many dates and easily provided throughout every article. I always imagine the infobox section as a "banner" space (since it kinda looks like one) - a place to put important info you'd hang a banner for. Championships, final fours, etc Huskerpower (talk) 15:16, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

::As a sports fan, this is a bad idea. We use these pages for quick references for tournament appearances as well as sweet 16 appearances, etc. Thid is useful information and not superfluous overkill or “participation” as stated. 38.18.89.136 (talk) 15:34, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

:Please add the tournament appearances and R32 appearances back. That was really nice to reference, to see how many appearances of a school were under the current coach. I don't think a supposedly awkward appearance (which I don't really think is that awkward) should trump having the information easily available 45.18.196.129 (talk) 16:48, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

:I've reverted the infobox back to the previous, long-standing appearance. To address some comments:

:* This is not a "barrage" of information, it's a few lines of years.

:* For truly elite teams, like Duke or UNC, yes they have a lot of appearances. For the vast majority of teams, they may only have 32 or Sweet Sixteen appearances, and the previous edit just listed them as "made the tournament."

:* This previous edit completely overrode the actual fans/editors of individual schools in how their team pages have looked for years.

:* The previous edit made it much, much harder to analyze programs' success at a glance.

:* No, this does not match the infoboxes for other NCAA sports. Because there are no other NCAA sports that have a similar post-season history that serves as a measure of success and that has such distinct levels. It's a poor argument to compare the NCAAT to any other college postseason.

:Tlboyd (talk) 18:46, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

::I am fine with adding it back, but we still haven't solve the original problem I had which was with the Round of 32, since certain pages included the Round of 32 and some didn't. I support simply removing the Round of 32 altogether as it is not that significant to win only one tournament game. Red0ctober22 (talk) 20:40, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

:::Going off of this, maybe perhaps a compromise can be that for teams that have never been to the Sweet 16, the Round of 32 can be included, but otherwise do not include the Round of 32 for any other teams. Red0ctober22 (talk) 20:42, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

::::Additionally, since the Sweet 16 and Elite 8 are back, we need to determine what the standard should be for years that the tournament was less than 32 teams. Does simply making the tournament and losing the first game in a year when the tournament was only 8 teams count as an Elite 8 appearance, and likewise with the Sweet 16 in 16-team years? Red0ctober22 (talk) 20:45, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

:::I think the reason you see it with some schools and not with others is simply because much like stated previously, sometimes that's the only successful tournament runs that a school has to their name. I'm in support of removing Round of 32 appearances for big schools like Kentucky or Duke, but most small mid-major programs I think would benefit from seeing years where they've made it to the second round. Just winning a tournament game might not be a huge deal at a school like Kansas, or even Mississippi State, but for schools like UMBC I think it's significant to mention. RichieNebraska (talk) 21:03, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

::::Most of the schools big or small have Round of 32 appearances, and I when I went to fix the last remaining few who didn't have them, I received pushback from editors who mainly only take care of that page. These schools were Houston and Michigan I believe, both teams with successful histories, but I don't really see why those editors think those schools are special compared to the rest. Red0ctober22 (talk) 21:59, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::"when I went to fix the last remaining few who didn't have them, I received pushback from editors who mainly only take care of that page."

:::::Perhaps the biggest takeaway here is to listen to the editors who are most invested in those pages, and don't assume that everyone is best suited by a major, over-arching decision that impacts every page and overrides that granularity. You're trying to solve a problem you created - that the round of 32 can differ from the Sweet Sixteen - by editing pages that already had active editors who were familiar with that specific school. And then you overreacted by just killing off all the varying levels of achievement.

:::::TL;DR: let editors manage their pages, R32 isn't a big deal Tlboyd (talk) 22:15, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

::::I agree with you though, even though it is winning only one game, it's still significant for a team like Fairleigh Dickinson or UMBC. As I said above, I think a good standard would be to only include the Round of 32 for teams that have never made it any further than that before. Red0ctober22 (talk) 22:20, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::I agree with your round of 32 standard when it comes to including/not including the results in the infobox. Seems like a relatively clear/simple cutoff considering the importance of winning a single tournament game in a given year varies depending on the school. TNNSUH (talk) 00:31, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::It wouldn't be difficult to modify the infobox template to display either Sweet 16 appearances or round of 32 appearances but not both, prioritizing the Sweet 16, if an editor enters data for both parameters. Actually, once the template is modified in such a manner, no one will need to remove the entries from every page. The entries simply won't show up. I'm pretty sure I could make the change to the template.

:::::I think being selected to an eight-team tournament is an Elite Eight appearance. With so few teams selected, getting invited merits the same status as winning your way there. However, that makes it theoretically possible to have an Elite Eight team that has never on a tournament game. Going further down the line, it's also possible to have a round of 32 appearance without ever winning a game (between 1975 and 1984). Nevertheless, if a team earned a bid to a 32-team tournament or received a bye to the round of 32 in a 40-, 48-, 52- or 53-team tournament, what they did to get there gives them the same status as a team that won a round of 64 game.

:::::If a team's only NCAA tournament win was in a First Four game, there is no easy way to discern that from the infobox. One possible solution would be to add a parameter that allows for the entry of a team's all-time NCAA tournament record, but only if the round of 32 parameter is empty. Thus, on Alabama State Hornets basketball, we would see a title NCAA tournament record with 1–5 showing up. This would also not be a difficult change to implement, particularly if there's no mechanism to stop editors from entering winless records. If we want to do that, the coding becomes more complicated.

:::::The CBB project's articles are for the majority of readers, most of whom are not editors. The feedback indicates to me that the infoboxes are relied upon heavily, more so than I had thought. So, I'm in favor of infobox design being responsive to that. Taxman1913 (talk) 17:56, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::I decided to be a little bold and make changes in the template's sandbox. There are four test cases you can see. For Texas, Fairleigh Dickinson and Alabama State, I added their all-time NCAA Division I tournament records after creating a new parameter for that. Otherwise, the data entered in the template are identical to the live pages. You can see that the R32 years currently show up for Texas in the live version. The change in the sandbox version of the template would eliminate this. For Fairleigh Dickinson, R32 years should show up, because they've never been to a Sweet 16, and the sandbox changes allow that to continue. For Alabama State, which has no Sweet 16 or R32 appearances, their all-time tournament record shows up after the sandbox changes. Citadel is included as a test case to make sure the sandbox changes don't wreck a team that has never been to a tournament. I added Duke as a fifth test case, because no R32 information is entered in that infobox. As expected, evan after adding the NCAA tourney record, the infoboxes are identical.

:::::I included "Division I" in the header title associated with the tournament record parameter, because I don't think it's important enough to have records of teams in the D2 or D3 tournaments showing up in infoboxes. This becomes more evident, when we consider that they will only show up for teams that have no entries in the R32 paramenter. Since I don't believe those tournaments have ever been larger than 64 teams, anyone entering D2 or D3 tournament records will likely be doing so for winless teams.

:::::What's missing here is the ability to enter D2 or D3 Sweet 16 or R32 appearances concurrent with showing a win in the Division I tournament. For example, in the test case, if Alabama State had beaten Chattanooga in the 1975 D2 tournament, there would be no way to enter in the Sweet 16 parameter "1975 (Division II)" and still show their 1–5 record in the Division I tournament. I don't know how many, if any, schools this affects. I imagine it would be very few.

:::::Please provide feedback about whether you think this gets us where we need to go and addresses the concerns expressed. Taxman1913 (talk) 21:44, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::I like the general idea in the test cases, however, I don’t think many people, even the schools themselves, see winning a First Four game as very significant, as in almost every case they just go on to get blown out by a 1 seed. What matters most to those schools is simply the fact that they made an appearance in the NCAA tournament. So in that case, I’m not sure a record would be totally necessary if the only wins it would show are First Four wins.

::::::Otherwise, a system where it can automatically eliminate the Round of 32 for teams that have made it further that you have made is great to have so that we don’t have to manually remove it for every team. Using modern standards in today’s 68-team tournament, the first goal of a tournament run for most high-major programs is to make it to that second weekend of the tournament anyway, so starting off at the Sweet 16 is a logical standard in my opinion. Red0ctober22 (talk) 22:08, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::Disagree about schools not viewing a First Four win as a big deal. That's an official NCAA Tournament win, like it or not, and the smaller schools who rarely get to play in the Big Dance absolutely take pride in First Four wins. SportsGuy789 (talk) 23:47, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::The types of schools that play in 16-seed First Four games absolutely think its a big deal to get a tournament win. These teams typlically come from leagues like the NEC, MEAC, SWAC, Southland, AmEast (if Vermont doesn't get in) or Patriot (if Colgate doesn't get in). For many of them, that single notch in their belt is a significant point of pride. You would think these leagues would prefer that they get a direct 16 seed and just play a no. 1. However, there are credits available for appearing in that winnable First Four game, and, in private conversations, I've been told the extra money you get for playing in the First Four makes a difference to cash starved league like these... if they win the First Four game. Taxman1913 (talk) 01:58, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

What if we have a parameter for "best NCAA tournament finish", and then a collapsed-by-default parameter for "other NCAA tournament finishes" below that? So for example, at Duke Blue Devils men's basketball, the five championships would appear by default in the first parameter, and everything else would be in the second parameter available by clicking "show". I think this would help reduce the initial visual clutter while still allowing readers the option of seeing all results with a single click. It's also an objective, fair, and consistently-enforceable standard. Left guide (talk) 06:55, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

:I like that idea, I just fear that making that much of a change to the coding of the infobox would "break" the infobox on every individual page until someone goes in and fixes each one manually. Red0ctober22 (talk) 11:55, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

::Which is why I think changes should be tested in sandboxes first. Left guide (talk) 19:51, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

:Support that idea. I agree with the general sentiment above that restricting it to Elite Eight or better is arbitrary and it discriminates against schools that hang their hat on making the tournament, given their size and status. But collapsing everything except for "best finish" seems ideal, it isn't arbitrary and it saves real estate in the infobox area of the articles. I'm not sure how it'd be implemented other than a group of volunteers rolling up their sleeves to divvy out the work on each team article, but it could be done. SportsGuy789 (talk) 14:33, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

::I'm willing to be in the {{tq|group of volunteers rolling up their sleeves to divvy out the work on each team article}}. Unfortunately, I lack the template literacy to easily make the desired changes on the template page in the first place, but I'll gladly pitch in article-side. Left guide (talk) 06:25, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

:I don't object to this, but plase see my explanation above and the related test cases that would immediately allow us to eliminate the display of R32 years for teams that have been to a Sweet 16 and show the records of teams that have an NCAA tournament win but no R32 appearace, i.e. First Four winners.

:Perhaps the sandbox version of the infobox can serve as a bridge. Then, we could create the bestfinish parameter and use it as a toggle. If it is empty on a page, the infobox would render as it does with the sandbox version. If the bestfinish parameter is not empty, the new look of the infobox will be displayed with the collapsed details. Taxman1913 (talk) 21:55, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

• I think the simplest way to accommodate this proposal would be to allow the existing parameters to be nested inside of the proposed new parameters, if possible. Is there anyone more template-literate than me who can help with this in the sandbox and testcase pages? Left guide (talk) 01:48, 17 April 2025 (UTC)
• :I'll give it a try. What you described was my idea of how it would work anyway. The idea is to avoid breaking infoboxes that do not currently have the bestfinish parameter entered. If it works, simply enteriing the bestfinish parameter on each page will make the infobox flip to the new look. I suggest the bestfinish parameter should be restricted to the best finish in the D-I tournament for teams that have played in tournaments across divisions. Otherwise, a team that won the D-II tournament and reached the Sweet 16 of the D-I tournament might have best finish as "National champion" with their best D-I result of Sweet 16 collapsed upon loading the page. It will be important to document how the new parameter is to be used. For a team that has always been a D-II team (very few of which have articles), using best finish for their best D-II result will be fine. Taxman1913 (talk) 02:13, 17 April 2025 (UTC)
• {{yo|Taxman1913|SportsGuy789|Red0ctober22}} Upon further reflection, a "best finish" parameter seems like overkill that creates unnecessary work. Using the Duke example, the championships can just appear as they are, with the "other NCAA tournament finishes" parameter and header collapsing the other results. Left guide (talk) 07:19, 17 April 2025 (UTC)
• :So for a team without a championship, would there just be the dropdown box called "NCAA tournament finishes" without anything outside of that box? Red0ctober22 (talk) 20:20, 17 April 2025 (UTC)
• ::If so, maybe we can agree on allowing for national championships, national runner-ups, and regional championships (Final Fours), along with conference tournament, regular season, and division titles, to be included standalone in the infobox, then everything else (Elite 8, Sweet 16, NCAA tournament appearances) can go in the collapsible box. This could be a "super compromise" of sorts, as we retain the original agreement to clean up the overkill by hiding anything that isn't an actual championship, but the tournament progression is still easily accessible for those who want to see it. Red0ctober22 (talk) 20:26, 17 April 2025 (UTC)
• :::If we are only showing actual championships on initial load (which I don't support), national runners-up should be excluded. Also, accommodating Division II isn't a big priority, but their eight regional champions all go to the Elite Eight. Dropping Elite Eight from the initial load with no workaround leaves this collapsed. I don't know how many articles this would affect. Probably only a handful. It is less important for a team currently classified as Division I. Nevertheless, this could be solved with the bestfinish parameter added to act as a toggle.
• :::I think its more useful to readers to have two headers display on initial load: best finish (with the label that already exists, not a new label called best finish) and other tournament results. This will be true for any team that has won a game in the tournament. Teams that have appeared but never won would just have the appearances header show with nothing collapsible. Taxman1913 (talk) 21:15, 17 April 2025 (UTC)
• ::::I think my last comment (and possibly the proposal in general) may have been partially misunderstood. My idea is that whatever the team's best finish is can be visible on initial load, whether that be championship, runner-up, Final Four, Elite Eight, or anything else. What I explained about Duke is merely an example for how it works in that particular context. Based on my understanding, I just doubt whether it's necessary to make a separate "best finish" parameter. However, if those folks more template-literate than me find a "best finish" parameter to be helpful in carrying out the proposal for reasons I don't understand, I wouldn't be opposed. Left guide (talk) 21:39, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

It's a glaring omission from the conversation above. Between 1972 and 1982 the AIAW women's basketball tournament was the national postseason tournament for women and the predecessor to the NCAA tournament. How will this be handled if the infobox tourney appearances coding gets changed? SportsGuy789 (talk) 23:50, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

:In the case, could there simply be a separate dropdown box for "Best AIAW finish"? Red0ctober22 (talk) 00:44, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

:Factoring in the AIAW really increases the messiness of the coding but doesn't make it impossible. I don't think we should end up wth something that ends up collapsing AIAW national champions on initial page load. Left guide mentions above that a best finish parameter is overkill and creates unnecessary work. I'm not sure what is meant by that. He cites Duke as an example. So, does that mean that teams that have won a national championship end up with two headers in the infobox on initial page load: National championships and other NCAA tournament results, while teams without a national championship end up with only one header: (other) NCAA tournament results? Either "other" displays for every team, or the template is coded to drop the word other when the natchamp parameter is empty. That would be fairly simple to accomplish.

:For a team whose best finish is a Final Four appearance, I would prefer that two headers load: Final Four appearances and other NCAA tournament results.

:I do not anticipate the bestfinish parameter resulting in a header in the infobox that displays what the user inputs. Instead, it is a logical parameter that sends the template on one of two paths: the display in presently in the sandbox or the soon to be built display with many details collapsed. It also allows the template to identify that the team has actually played in the D-I (or AIAW) tournament. I envision this parameter as a switch that guides how the template displays the infbox. Once we know it works, it can be expanded to include team results in non-D-I tournaments that might be displayed in the infobox.

:If we do not use a best finish parameter and only select the best header based ona hierarchy, a team with a D-II national championship and a D-I Sweet 16 as their best finishes will display the natchamp and other headers on initial load. I think the D-I Sweet 16 is probably the most significant item to readers, and that should be what displays on initial load. There is no way for the template to know which data are D-I and which are non-D-I without a separate parameter. Taxman1913 (talk) 15:11, 17 April 2025 (UTC)

Before I start modifying the infobox template to create the collapsible feature, is there consensus to update the live template to the versionn currently in the sandbox? Please look over the test cases and voice your opinion here. This update will reflect consensus expressed above that we really don't need to see R32 appearances for teams that have been to a Sweet 16. On the downside, if a team's has entires in the Sweet 16 parameter for D-II or D-II performances, and its best finish in the D-I tournament was R32, the R32 appearances will no longer show up. I don't know how many teams this affects.

I plan to start working on the collapsibility feature 24 hours from now. So, if there's consensus to make the update, I'll do that before messing with the template any further. I'll also update the documentation. Taxman1913 (talk) 13:03, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

:I support this plan. I think in terms of the whole D2/D1 situation, as you said, I don't think this affects that many teams, and for most teams that switched from D2 to D1, its likely because they had some sort of decent tournament success, so they most likely have at least a Final Four in D2 or something. In that case, I would assume programs probably take more pride in a D2 championship than a D1 R32 appearance. Red0ctober22 (talk) 17:12, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

::I've been doing a lot of research on Le Moyne's history for the past year and a half. They reclassified from D-II in 2023. From what I've seen about their opponents during their D-II era, I would say that high achievement at the D-II level in MBB is not a predictor of whether a team ultimately reclassifies. Teams that were either in the same conference as Le Moyne or regular opponents of theirs and then reclassified had both glorious and spotty D-II results. A year and a half ago, I knew almost nothing about D-II basketball. I've learned a lot since then. The quality of play was much higher in the past, which makes sense, because there were far fewer D-I programs and notmany scholarships to go around.

::Le Moyne drew home crowds for highly anticipated games in excess of 2,000, with Syracuse playing only four miles away. Some of their regular opponents would draw crowds of 3,000 or more. In the 1950s and 1960s, Le Moyne was able to schedule home games against ranked D-I opponents, and the program has 65 wins over D-I programs during its D-II era with three of those wins coming over ranked D-I teams. Their deepest run in the D-II tournament is a single Elite Eight appearance. So, their R32 appearances will disappear with the changes to the template.

::From what I've seen the two biggest factors in pulling the trigger on reclassifying are availabiity of money and desire for prestige. Success in MBB can generate donations and move the needle. The decision becomes far more complex for schools sponsoring football, since they're unlikely to get an FBS conference invitation, and FCS football can be a significant drain on resources. Taxman1913 (talk) 22:29, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

:::After taking a look at a lot of pages, I think this system looks great and works well to make it easier for editors. Just one last thing though, I notice some women's pages, most notably Tennessee, uses the NCAA second round parameter instead of the Round of 32 parameter, I suppose because the women's tournament took a little while to get to 64 teams despite being created in 1982. Could you possibly make another entry that removes the second round parameter if Sweet Sixteen appearances are present like you did with the Round of 32 parameter? Red0ctober22 (talk) 12:39, 23 April 2025 (UTC)

::::I think that's a great idea to round things out. I'll incorporate that into the changes I'm making so it works even if no bestfinish paramter is present, i.e. the infobox is not using the collapsible feature. Taxman1913 (talk) 16:13, 23 April 2025 (UTC)

• Thank you to those who have been working in the sandboxes and test cases. When I look at the test cases transcluded from the sandbox, I don't see the "lesser finishes" for a given school appearing even in a collapsed-by-default location in the infobox; those results don't appear. Is there a reason for this? Left guide (talk) 21:03, 24 April 2025 (UTC)
• :Still in progress. I had a coding error that was difficult to find. The intended final outcome is as you described. Taxman1913 (talk) 19:50, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to this effort to standardize, I am very pleased with the constructive discussions that took place and the results. One more thing though, I find that some team pages link years in the infobox, e.g. Purdue or Florida, and I wanted to find consensus on if this should be a standard or not. If we do agree to linking, I think the standard should be to only link Final Fours or championships/runner-ups. Using the Florida page as an example, under the "Final Four" parameter, I would link "1994" to "1993–94 Florida Gators men's basketball team", "2000" to "1999–2000 Florida Gators men's basketball team", and so on. Then, under runner-up, I would link "2000" to 2000 NCAA Division I men's basketball championship game, and under championships I would link "2006" to "2006 NCAA Division I men's basketball championship game". This way, people can view both the team's respective season, and the championship game they appeared in or won. Obviously, college basketball is a sport that has a lot more individual team season pages missing compared to the others, even a big program like Villanova has some seasons missing from the late 90s on here I believe. However, I am pretty sure almost every Final Four team has their own page for that season. There is also the factor of conference tournaments if we would link those (For example, in Villanova's "conference tournament champions" cell, where it says "2018", we would link it to the 2018 Big East men's basketball tournament), but that might be unnecessary. Red0ctober22 (talk) 17:43, 24 April 2025 (UTC)

:I don't feel passionate about a standardization rule for this. Most of these articles have one or a handful of editors who effectively act as curators. The passion of these individual editors plays a huge role in our project's continuous growth in the volume and quality of articles, and I have no doubt that is something we all want. The majority of those editors don't regularly participate here (which is their own choice) and won't see the discussion which has now commenced. So, if a standardization decision is reached, it will be without their input. We can expect some negative feedback and, perhaps, refusals to comply as they add back links that someone has removed. I understand the value and benefits associated with standardization. But is it worthwhile to risk consequences that may be detrimental to the project in order to standardize something that won't change the amount of viewable text?

:If a consensus forms in favor of standardizing this, I think that it ought to be permissible for a team's best finish to be wikilinked. If someone is reading the Fairleigh Dickinson article, there's a decent chance they would want to read the artile on the 2022–23 season. That R32 appearance is not currently wikilinked on the live page, but it would be difficult for me to argue that it should not be. Taxman1913 (talk) 20:24, 24 April 2025 (UTC)

::That makes sense. I was actually debating about additionally asking about for a standardization for the formatting if a team has won a conference title in multiple different conferences, but a detail like that, similar to linking years, is probably best left to individual editors who heavily edit those respective pages. Red0ctober22 (talk) 01:12, 25 April 2025 (UTC)

::I always believed that the best finish for a year should be the only one listed, reducing duplication and clutter for the earlier rounds. Then I'd link that year's team, as most readers at the general team page would then more likely want to know more about their specific team that year, which in turn will have links (or even a section) about that year's tourney. If the team for the specific year is deemed not worth linking, then the infobox should just be listing cumlative appearance totals. Otherwise, why list the years in the first place? —Bagumba (talk) 04:58, 25 April 2025 (UTC)

Case in point, Florida's Olivier Rioux. He redshirted this year as a true freshman and didn't appear in a game. But he has a championship navbox on his page now. SportsGuy789 (talk) 03:21, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:If it was the Stanley Cup, he wouldn't have his name etched onto the trophy. Of course, that's not the standard. Just because he was on scholarship there, I don't think that's enough for him to have a claim at being a member of a national championship team. Had he played the first three games of the season, gotten injured and taken a medical redshirt, I would probably feel differently. Without appearing in a game, he was basically a practice player who travelled with the team. Taxman1913 (talk) 06:20, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

::No, we have never done this and there are many examples over time where this applies. For example, Seth Curry was a redshirt on the 2010 Duke team. Readers are using these navboxes years later to remember who was on the team that won. Rioux didn’t play a minute this season for the Gators. Rikster2 (talk) 16:48, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:::He was still on the team. [https://www.si.com/college-basketball/florida-center-olivier-rioux-cut-down-net-without-a-ladder-one-last-time Reliable sources show] him cutting down the nets after winning the national championship with his team. Clearly a member of the national championship team, deserving any such navbox honors. PK-WIKI (talk) 17:08, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

::::I don't think that's definitive. The team manager may have been given a turn with the scissors as well. Simply cutting down the nets is not, by itself, a basis for someone to be considered a national champion. I'm sure Rioux worked very hard in practice this season, but it is difficult to call him a national championship player when he did not play. Taxman1913 (talk) 18:10, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

::::{{tqq|Reliable sources show him cutting down the nets after winning the national championship with his team}}. Using a photo of someone cutting down nets to call him/her a "national champion" on Wikipedia is a form of WP:OR. To call a player a national champion, there must be reliable sources directly calling him/her a national champion. Per WP:RSPSI, present-day SI isn't clearly a reliable source anyway. Left guide (talk) 19:19, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::USA Today then? [https://ftw.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaab/2025/04/08/olivier-rioux-height-florida-march-madness-nets-no-ladder/82987616007/ {{tpq|Olivier Rioux is 7-foot-9, but because he was a freshman redshirt, he didn't play for the Florida Gators this season. Still, he's a national champion like the rest of his team after the March Madness win over Houston on Monday.}}] PK-WIKI (talk) 20:37, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::I'd say that counts per WP:USATODAY and the direct verification shown. Left guide (talk) 20:54, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::It does not seem the USA Today article's context indicates the journalist intented to make a definitive, authoritative statement about Rioux's status as a national champion. It is doubtful that the article would have been written had Rioux not cut the net without the aid of a ladder. That seems to be what the article is truly about. While USA Today is a reliable source, WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. Since Rioux is the first in my memory to have cut the net without a ladder, it's understandable that we haven't seen articles in the past about redshirted players in which they are proclaimed national champions. Despite the USA Today article, I'm quite sure SRCBB is not going to put "2025 national champion" on Rioux's profile page. If Rioux is to be added back to the navbox, (redshirted) should appear next to his name. The inconsistency thereby created would necessitate reviewing other naxboxes for players like Seth Curry who might have been missed... which will create a knock-on problem, since there is no WP:RS that will confirm Seth Curry was a national champion in 2010. The inability to achieve consistency is a very good reason to leave Rioux out of the navbox. That, coupled with the context of the cited source, makes this a clear call in my view. Taxman1913 (talk) 21:44, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::: Cutting down nets is an arbitrary thing, teams can have anyone help cut down the nets. I would equate it to getting an NBA championship ring. Teams can give anyone a ring but if a player is traded away mid season and is not with the team during the playoffs, the NBA doesn’t count them as a champ even if the team decides to give them a ring. Rioux was not an active member of the team this year. If he had played even one regular season game That would be different. But he didn’t and, again, we have been very consistent with this through the years. And, no, some random USA Today reporter isn’t the determinant factor here. Rikster2 (talk) 22:00, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::I'm really not seeing ANY reason to not list him as a national champion. If other similar players haven't been given the same honor on Wikipedia, we should correct that omission.

:::::::::The Florida Gators have him [https://floridagators.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster on the roster] of their national championship team, marked as a "Freshman" and in the same table as all of the starters and reserve players on the team. He suited up for the national championship game. As far as I am aware there is no official/disqualifying status for "redshirt" freshman, so he assumedly could have and would have gone into the national championship game at a moment's notice had his coach called for that substitution due to injury or a set play that required Rioux's height.

:::::::::A reliable source, national newspaper USA Today, directly says that he is a national champion along with the rest of his team despite not playing any minutes.

:::::::::How far are we going to go with this? He's a freshman on the national championship team. He cut down the national championship nets along with his team. He'll presumably get a national championship ring. He'll shake the president's hand at the white house. He'll be honored at the on-campus national championship parade and hoist the national championship trophy at the field house. He'll be in the national championship roster photo along with the starters and other players on the team.

:::::::::Denying him "national champion" status because you think he doesn't deserve it is WP:ORIGINALRESEARCH.

:::::::::PK-WIKI (talk) 22:26, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::he did not play a game for the team. Not a minute. That’s not original research. His college debut has not occurred, that is also in that SI piece you linked. Wikipedia is about putting objective standards for ambiguous situations. It would be misleading to future readers to include him. The natural response (if he is remembered then) would be “I didn’t remember he played for that team.” That’s because he didn’t. Rikster2 (talk) 22:52, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::The connection that "not playing a game for the team" equals "not a national champion" is original research. Left guide (talk) 23:06, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::::::he was not eligible to play a minute for the team. And as Bagumba said, we have similar situations with past players not being called national champs by independent sources, so we should follow that in this case. Rikster2 (talk) 23:18, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::How many other members of the team didn't play a single minute? We don't know because that stat isn't tracked as something that matters. They're members of the team or they aren't. This isn't an ambiguous situation.

:::::::::::So if a second-string Quarterback is part of the 53-man roster, but ends up not playing any snaps on the way to the Super Bowl, he's not a Super Bowl champion? But the third-string QB is because he took 2 snaps in garbage time? Pure WP:OR. PK-WIKI (talk) 23:09, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::::Of course we can track who didn’t play a single minute on the season (which is what we are talking about, not just the tourney) - it would be in the season stats (or rather missing from them ). But Rioux was not even eligible all season for coach Golden, because he was a redshirt - that’s the issue. By the way, “For The Win” (where your link comes from) is owned by USA Today, but it is not the newspaper’s sports section. It is a social media property. I would argue it is not covered under USA Today as a reliable source. Rikster2 (talk) 23:14, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::::Since the reliability appears to have been challenged, I've raised that matter at WP:RSN#For The Win (USA Today) to seek wider community input. Left guide (talk) 00:05, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::::A redshirt freshman is a player who is an active, eligible, member of the team who can come in to play at any time.

:::::::::::::After the season, if they don't play in any games (or less than X minutes) they can lobby the NCAA for a redshirt waiver that gives them another year of eligibility. Redshirt seasons can be "burned" by the freshman playing in a game.

:::::::::::::This is confirmed by the New York Times in last year's tournament:

::::::::::::::For seven minutes of playing time, he burned his medical redshirt

::::::::::::::https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5347945/2024/03/20/longwood-ncaa-tournament-trey-hicks/

:::::::::::::: {{tpq|But when he checked into the Big South Championship game against UNC Asheville four minutes into the second half, on what could be the Lancers’ next-to-last game of the season (as a 16-seed, they’ll play No. 1 seed Houston in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Friday), Hicks burned his shot at that redshirt season. An improbable confluence of circumstances put Longwood in a situation to need Hicks; but it was Hicks who answered the call. “I told Coach, if you need me, you got me,’’ Hicks says. “For a program that has done so much for me, that’s the least I could do.”}}

:::::::::::::Olivier Rioux was an active member of the national championship team. He could have played at any time in the national championship game, just as Trey Hicks did last year.

:::::::::::::PK-WIKI (talk) PK-WIKI (talk) 23:35, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::::::Except, he wasn't. He could not play a single minute because he was declared a redshirt prior to the season. He was not active, nor eligible. Ball boys don't get official championships. He could not "have played at any time in the national championship game." Game, set, match. SportsGuy789 (talk) 23:53, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::::::Post a reliable source citation you can be "declared a redshirt prior to the season" in college basketball, and that this would make him ineligible to play in subsequent games.

:::::::::::::::You say that Rioux was "not active, nor eligible" on the season, yet the Associated Press [https://apnews.com/article/florida-gators-olivier-rioux-tallest-teenager-897a48d6f01a3b65f7d20cf2a6548537 quotes his coach after the fourth game of the season] saying:

:::::::::::::::{{tpq|“Honestly, it’s put him in a tough situation. He’s sitting over there at the end of games and everybody’s yelling at him and trying to get him out there. They just hadn’t understood that that was our potential plan for him. “So that’s where we’re at at this moment. I’m not saying that’s 100% going to be the plan. We’ll continue to talk to him and see if he changes what he wants to do. But as of right now, that’s the plan that we’re going to have with him as we move forward.”}}

:::::::::::::::Rioux was an active, eligible freshman player on the Florida gators national championship team that could have played at any time in any game, including in the national championship game. PK-WIKI (talk) 00:05, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::::::::Not how it works, he still has four years of eligibility and Golden announced early on he was redshirting. The season is over, his status as a redshirt who did not play a game can not be disputed. Rikster2 (talk) 00:15, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::::::::None of that has anything to do with the question at hand. He was an eligible, active member of the team during the entire season and including the national championship game. Your assertion that he must play at a minimum 1 second of game time at any point during the season to be considered a national champion is COMPLETE original research. PK-WIKI (talk) 16:43, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::::::::: It abides by the same exact standard set forth in this WikiProject in the mid-2000's that players need to appear in a regular season or postseason game in order to be added to "Category:School Team men's basketball players", because if they've literally never played for the school then they aren't players with any statistical measurement for the school, hence no category. Applying this logic to redshirt players not being national champions is not WP:OR, it's actually quite consistent. SportsGuy789 (talk) 19:04, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::{{re|PK-WIKI}} {{tqq|I'm really not seeing ANY reason to not list him as a national champion.}} I provided two reasons. I'll repeat them here for your convenience: (1) WP:CONTEXTMATTERS and (2) The project would be unable to achieve consistency by including Rioux in the navbox, because we would be unable to find a reliable source saying that each player who was on a team that won a championship during a season such player was redshirting is recognized as a national champion. Your responses have addressed neither of these points in a realistic way. Instead, you said, {{tqq|If other similar players haven't been given the same honor on Wikipedia, we should correct that omission.}} How would we go about doing that without any reliable sources to support such "honor on Wikipedia"? By the way, what is an "honor on Wikipedia"? I know editors can get barnstars and other recognitions. However, the subject of an encyclopedia article is not being honored. I don't see Florida as being "honored" by having a gold bar across the top of the infobox on their team season page. It is there as a visual reference for users. If Rioux's name is in the navbox, this is not an honor; it is information for users, and such information would be incorrect and misleading, since he didn't play.

::::::::::As you have correctly pointed out, redshirt status does not become final until the season ends. So, of course, Rioux is on the 2024–25 roster and was eligible to play in the championship game. Now, the season has ended. His redshirt status can be confirmed. He didn't play a single minute during the season, and he did not consume a year of playing eligibility. Next season, he'll be on the roster again, if he doesn't transfer. He will be listed again as a freshman (or redshirt freshman by detail-oriented roster composers). So, which season will be his freshman season for eligibility purposes?

::::::::::{{tqq|How far are we going to go with this?}} That doesn't sound like a good way to engage in discourse. Frankly, it sounds more like you just want to get your way. Others here want to make the best decision for the encyclopedia. Presented with an overwhelming number of reasons he should not be in the navbox, you continue to repeat the same arguments, all of which have been refuted. For example, {{tqq|A reliable source, national newspaper USA Today, directly says that he is a national champion along with the rest of his team despite not playing any minutes.}} The point has been raised that such statement is being taken out of context. Yet, you repeat it without offering a rebuttal to that assessment. Keep in mind, as has previously been noted, the team manager may have also been given an opportunity to cut the nets. Such manager may also get a ring and make a trip to the White House. Houston can really do whatever they want in this regard. If he does get a ring, I'm happy for him. As I said previously, I'm sure he worked hard in practice this season. But so did the kid who launders the towels, and no one thinks he belongs in the navbox.

::::::::::{{tqq|Denying him "national champion" status because you think he doesn't deserve it is WP:ORIGINALRESEARCH.}} Again, there is no such thing as Wikipedia national championship status. This is not about what I or you or anyone else thinks Rioux "deserves". It is about what is the most informative and least misleading presentation for the encyclopedia.

::::::::::{{tqq|How many other members of the team didn't play a single minute? We don't know because that stat isn't tracked as something that matters.}} Actually, yes we can find that out, and yes, it does matter. Unlike professional sports, the NCAA has years of eligibility rules. This means it matters very much. We can see that Houston had 17 players on their roster.{{cite web|url=https://stats.ncaa.org/teams/590630/roster|title=Florida Gators 2024–25 Men's Basketball Roster|website=NCAA Statistics|access-date=April 8, 2025}} We can also see that Houston had 16 players on their statistics report.{{cite web|url=https://stats.ncaa.org/teams/590630/season_to_date_stats|title=Florida Gators 2024–25 Men's Basketball Team Statistics|website=NCAA Statistics|access-date=April 8, 2025}} The smallest number of minutes by a player on the statistics report is 2:29 by Kevin Pazmino, who was clearly a member of the team. He appeared in three games. Olivier Rioux is the only player on the roster, who does not appear on the statistics report. So, no one else on the roster didn't play a single minute. Rioux is the only one.

::::::::::{{tqq|How far are we going to go with this?}} I hope not much longer. Please carefully consider the points that have been raised, and you'll realize Rioux does not belong in the navbox. Taxman1913 (talk) 03:21, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

:::Curry's SRCBB profile does not list "NCAA champion".[https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/players/seth-curry-1.html]. Are there other sources that call them champions? —Bagumba (talk) 17:31, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

::::Yes, and the same site [https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/players/walter-claytonjr-1.html says Walter Clayton Jr. is a national champion], but [https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/players/olivier-rioux-1.html Rioux is not]. That’s because he was not an eligible member of the team this season. Rikster2 (talk) 23:21, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::Seth Curry not having national champion denoted in his Sports-Reference profile speaks volumes. This alone is evidence that Rioux is not a national champion as provided by the single most reliable, third-party college basketball source out there. In other words, it's not original research to exclude Rioux. Moreover, every WikiProject is allowed to set its own standards. WP:CBBALL set this standard 20 years ago and it's for the greater good, and nobody up until the other day was butt hurt by the decision. In fact, all WP:CBBALL editors have agreed with and leaned into the idea that redshirts who don't play are not qualified to be national champions in the infoboxes or navboxes. SportsGuy789 (talk) 19:12, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::Self-published website "Sports Reference dot com" is absolutely not the {{tpq|"single most reliable, third-party college basketball source out there"}} and their chosen markup of national champion players says nothing about what we should do on Wikipedia. "Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable, published secondary sources, and to a lesser extent, on tertiary sources and primary sources." This stats website is a WP:TERTIARY source. The reliable, published secondary sources on the matter are in full agreement that Olivier Rioux was an active, eligible player on the Gators' roster during the entire season and in the national championship game. Every WikiProject is not allowed to set their own standards: we all must follow Wikipedia:No original research, Wikipedia:Verifiability, and Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. PK-WIKI (talk) 20:02, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::Per Taxman above, WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. You cherry picked one sentence from an article where the author was flippantly referring to Rioux as a national champion, it doesn't mean he was. Also, yes, each WikiProject can set its own standards. I'm not saying they can go against original research. But what I am saying is that your assertion that Rioux is a champion is just as original as the opposite. Also, whatever the guys over at WP:CFB decided (which was never definitive) does not impact WP:CBBALL. And, you obviously don't know anything about Sports Reference LLC if you think they're as unreliable as you claim. A blog - lol. SportsGuy789 (talk) 20:11, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::Olivier Rioux was clearly an active, suited-up player on the roster of the Florida Gators' national championship-winning team, per every available source.

::::::::You have still provided no reliable, third-party, secondary source saying that Olivier Rioux is not a national champion. Please provide a reliable secondary source that says he was not.

::::::::PK-WIKI (talk) PK-WIKI (talk) 20:26, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::[https://www.sportskeeda.com/about-us Sportskeeda] is a global sports and esports media platform, founded in 2009, that covers a wide range of sports and esports, offering news, articles, live coverage, and videos, serving over 100 million fans monthly. It is the flagship brand of [https://www.absolutesports.media/ Absolute Sports]. Sportskeeda has full transparency of their editorial process [https://www.sportskeeda.com/editorialteam here]. Per [https://www.sportskeeda.com/college-basketball/could-7-9-olivier-rioux-get-championship-ring-despite-playing-florida-exploring-ncaa-redshirt-rules-and-similar-cases this article]: {{tqq|NCAA rules state that he will not receive a championship ring. He can, however, have a piece of the championship nets ... Olivier Rioux did not play in the Florida Gators' NCAA championship run because he took a redshirt year ... Rioux was not on the court for the Florida Gators when they won the March Madness championship game against the Houston Cougars. As a result, he will not receive a championship ring. According to NCAA rules, players are only eligible to receive a ring or award for winning a championship if they were eligible to play. "Awards for winning an individual or team conference or national championship may be presented each year, limited in value and number as specified in Figure 16-2. Awards for winning a conference or national championship in a team sport may be provided only to student-athletes who were eligible to participate in the championship event." Since Rioux was redshirting, he was not eligible to play in the championship game and will not receive a ring.'''}}

:::::::::He was ineligible, point blank period. Stop looking more foolish each time you say he was eligible. Furthermore, the NCAA literally defines him as ineligible to win a championship ring. But let me guess, you're going to try and dodge and deflact that damning point by saying "a rInG dOeSn'T mEaN wE cAn'T pUt HiM oN a NaVboX!" which yes, that's exactly what it means. SportsGuy789 (talk) 01:00, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::WP:SPORTSKEEDA is listed as Generally Unreliable" at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources: {{tpq|Sportskeeda is considered generally unreliable due to a consensus that there is little or no editorial oversight over the website's content, which is largely user-written.}}

::::::::::I can understand why it's considered "generally unreliable", because the particular article you posted makes an obvious factual error: {{tpq|"Since Rioux was redshirting, he was not eligible to play in the championship game and will not receive a ring."}} We have already covered this. He WAS eligible to play in the national championship game. His coach could have substituted him at any point during the game. The New York Times (which is a reliable source) [https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5347945/2024/03/20/longwood-ncaa-tournament-trey-hicks/ wrote an entire article last year] about this very situation: a "redshirt" player being substituted into an end-of-season championship game.

::::::::::The [https://web3.ncaa.org/lsdbi/bylaw?bylawId=15465&division=1&adopted=0 NCAA guidelines quoted] in your article only support my position. Rioux was eligible to play; thus he is eligible for a national championship ring. Your Sportskeeda article even directly states "players who are eligible to play but did not get playing time are still eligible to receive a ring." PK-WIKI (talk) 01:53, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::PK, I have to partially agree with you on the Sportskeeda article. Before you posted your most recent comment, I was already reviewing the Division I Manual to verify the author's statement about no ring being permitted, because Rioux was ineligible. It is my understanding that redshirt status is never confirmed until the season is over, and the player remains eligible even after requesting a redshirt season. My review of the Manual confirms that notion. Not inserting Rioux into a game is the result of a voluntary decision necessary to qualify him as a redshirt. Todd Golden literally made that decision during every second of every game they played this season.

:::::::::::But here's where we disagree. The Division I Manual says: {{tqq|The awards limitations of Bylaw 16.1 apply to awards received by a student-athlete for participation in competition while representing the student-athlete's institution. Such awards may not include cash or cash equivalents, gift certificates or gift cards that are redeemable for cash (original amount or any balance thereof), or a country club or sports club membership.}}{{cite book|url=https://www.ncaapublications.com/productdownloads/D125.pdf|title=NCAA Division I 2024–25 Manual|publisher=National Collegiate Athletic Association|date=August 9, 2024|access-date=April 9, 2025}}{{rp|202}} We can clearly see here why Rioux cannot be given a national championship ring (which I didn't know prior to digging into this). It would violate section 16.1.1.2 of the Division I Manual, since it would not be for "participation in competition while representing the student-athlete's institution" as the Manual requires. Practicing and traveling with the team is not participating in competition while representing Florida. In order to meet that standard, a player would need to appear in a regulation game. Based on this, I disagree with Sportskeeda that a player who sat on the bench all year without applying for a redshirt would qualify for a ring. The player would not have participated in competition.

:::::::::::If the standard the NCAA is using for recognition (via awards) of student-athletes is participation in competition while representing the institution, why should a different standard be used on Wikipedia to identify student-athletes as having been so recognized? I don't see any justification for doing so; this is a bright-line, easy-to-understand rule. The NCAA is the organization that awards the team basketball championship and decides which players on the winning team may receive awards in recognition of contributing to such. Is Wiipedia in a position to correct some sort of error or oversight by the NCAA with regard to the competition the NCAA administers?

:::::::::::We continue to see the USA Today article referenced in this thread without a rebuttal to the assertion that this is not reliable, because WP:CONTEXTMATTERS.

:::::::::::Suppose Rover and Fido are finalists in a dog show. Rover is voted the winner and entitled to a large pile of bones. During the ceremony in which Rover is being recognized, Fido dashes toward the pile of bones, grabs one and runs off. A journalist reports this by writing, "Fido showed he's a champ, too, as he swiped a bone from Rover's stash." Does that statement make Fido co-champion, if it was published by a reliable source? Of course not. Rioux is Fido.

:::::::::::Oddly, this is continually brought up by PK-WIKI, who has already asked how far we are going to go with this. I suppose we're going to go as far as PK-WIKI takes us by continuing to raise arguments that have been refuted by a broad consensus of contributors to this thread. I'll ask you again, PK, to please review all that has been said above about this matter. It appears you are not objective. Please try your very best to be so. Look at the arguments you are making with skepticism. I truly believe that you will be able to see that Rioux simply does not belong in the navbox. Taxman1913 (talk) 03:11, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::::Thank you for looking into the NCAA regulations. I agree that a "redshirt" season is determined after the season is over. The student athlete is on the active roster and remains eligible to play during the season itself, but if they end up not playing then they are automatically granted an extra year of eligibility. There is no official "declaration" of intent to redshirt either by the school or player, and at no point is the player "ineligible" or "inactive". Todd Golden easily could have substituted Rioux into the final play of the national championship game, just like any other player on the team.

::::::::::::Your other quoted regulation mentions {{tpq|"awards received by a student-athlete for participation in competition while representing the student-athlete's institution."}} I don't read this _nearly_ as strictly as you are. Rioux traveled to participate in competitions while representing Florida, and, crucially, suited up and was ready to play at a moment's notice in the competition at the direction of his head coach. He participated in the competition by being one of a small number of elegible substitutes, just like the other benchwarmers on his team. I seriously doubt the NCAA is making a hard-and-fast requirement for played game minutes in this three-decimal subsection of their regulations. I do not think this regulation will be used to prevent him from getting a ring, and I reject that your interpretation of this subsection is how the NCAA would interpret it.

::::::::::::I'm not sure why you would say {{tpq|"It appears you are not objective."}} I have no ties to either team in the finals and just learned about this tall kid yesterday. It's an interesting question for college Basketball and Football redshirt articles, and our coverage here should based on how the awards are handled by the schools, the NCAA, and by reliable third-party secondary sources. I hope others agree.

::::::::::::PK-WIKI (talk) 07:38, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::::You appear to not be objective, because you are ignoring points raised by others and engaging in WP:BLUDGEONING by continuing to bring up the same source without addressing WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. Taxman1913 (talk) 15:28, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

{{od|:::::::::::::}}

I believe that the discussion that has taken place here and the research it has inspired have taught many of us new things. I, for one, wasn't aware that there is a specific NCAA rule that describes which student-athletes may receive awards like championship rings. I did know there was a value limitation, but it has never been important to me to understand whether they can be given to players who redshirted. I believe that simple logic allows us to conclude that if a player cannot receive a championship ring under NCAA rules, such player is not considered an NCAA champion. Afterall, why would the NCAA consider the player a champion but deny the student-athlete a ring? It is the NCAA's championship and their decision to make.

The rule describing who may receive any award of any sort for representing the student-athlete's institution is cited above from section 16.1.1.2 of the Division I Manual, and it includes a requirement that the award be presented for participating in competition while representing the institution. In my view, that is a standard that is impossible for a player who opted to redshirt during a championship season to have met. The player simply did not "participate in competition". This may not include other types of redshirts. For instance, a player who suffered a season-ending injury in the first game of the season and qualified for a medical redshirt clearly did participate in competition. In contrast, a player who suffered a season-ending injury during the preseason and qualified for a medical redshirt did not participate in competition. A player who opted to redshirt is not, by definition, a member of a championship team under NCAA rules.

PK_WIKI disputes and rejects the plain reading of the Division I Manual, saying: {{tqq|I seriously doubt the NCAA is making a hard-and-fast requirement for played game minutes in this three-decimal subsection of their regulations. I do not think this regulation will be used to prevent him from getting a ring, and I reject that your interpretation of this subsection is how the NCAA would interpret it.}} I dispute the suggestion that a plain reading of the rule constitutes my interpretation. Rather, a plain reading is likely the "interpretation" of nearly everyone on earth other than PK-WIKI. It has been my observation that the NCAA enforces all its rules, including those in three-digit subsections. A few years ago, Oklahoma State was punished with a poastseason ban over a payment (I believe $150) that was less than the value of a championship ring. The payment was made by an assistant coach, who was terminated, to a player without the head coach's knowledge and self-reported by the school to the NCAA. So, the pure speculation on the part of PK-WIKI, speculation PK-WIKI cannot support with a reliable source, that the NCAA will decide to give a special pass to Florida and Rioux, while ignoring its own rules, is inconsistent with the observable reality on the ground.

I propose that this project adopt a guideline for notations of any sort that a player in NCAA competion was a member of a championship team, including, but not limited to, national champion, conference tournament champion or conference regular-season champion. Such guideline should read: NCAA players may be identifed as a member of a championship team, whether such championship is national or conference, only if such player qualifies under NCAA rules as a valid recipient of awards permitted to be presented to members of such championship team.

Since PK-WIKI has disputed the plain reading of the Division I Manual, I further propose the project adopt a second guideline, which, in my opinion, should not be necessary but has become so due to PK-WIKI's WP:BLUDGEONING. Such guideline should read: Where the plain language of any NCAA legislation is clear, alternative or speculative interpretations of such language should not influence any pages covered by this project. Taxman1913 (talk) 15:15, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

:Adopt both of the proposed guidelines. Taxman1913 (talk) 15:22, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

:There is a reason we prefer secondary sources, and avoid using WP:PRIMARY sources, on Wikipedia. Wikipedia:Reliable sources says (emphasis mine) {{tpq|we publish only the analysis, views, and opinions of reliable authors, and not those of Wikipedians, who have read and interpreted primary source material for themselves.}} and {{tpq|When relying on primary sources, extreme caution is advised. Wikipedians should never interpret the content of primary sources for themselves (see Wikipedia:No original research and Wikipedia:Neutral point of view])}}.

:Your interpretation of this NCAA guideline primary source document is exactly the type of original research the policies above are warning against. Taking the NCAA phrase "participation in competition while representing the student-athlete's institution" to mean the hard-and-fast binary of "has game minutes in the statistics report" is WP:ORIGINAL RESEARCH. I think it's more likely to encompass other aspects of "participation" in "competition", such as serving as a suited-up, eligible, substitute player on the official roster who can immediately be relied upon to enter the game. PK-WIKI (talk) 17:01, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

::User:PK-WIKI could have simply voted to reject my proposals. Instead, the WP:BLUDGEONING continues. We have been treated to a discussion of why WP:SECONDARY sources are preferable to WP:PRIMARY sources. I completely agree that secondary sources are preferable. However, in this case, no secondary source has been offered that says Rioux is a national champion. PK-WIKI continues ignoring that the source he offered violates WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. PK-WIKI instead pretends that the point has not been brought up in an effort to continue his crusade to get others to agree that Rioux is a national champion. In the absence of any secondary source that says anything about Rioux's status, I've used a plain reading of a primary source that demonstrates Rioux is not entitiled to any award that would be presented to his teammates in recognition of Florida's national championship. A primary source is better than no source. PK-WIKI attempts to mislead others by saying I interpreted the phase "participation in competition while representing the student-athlete's institution" to mean "has game minutes in the statistics report". I made no such interpretation. In fact, I made no interpretation at all, because none is necessary to understand what the words mean. Anyone, other than perhaps PK-WIKI, who is fluent in English can understand what participation in competition means. There is no doubt that it means appearing in a game. If we are uncertain whether Rioux appeared in a game, we can consult the NCAA Statistics report and see that he did not. Therefore, Rioux did not participate in competition. Instead of relying on the primary source, which is the only reliable source found so far, PK-WIKI prefers to make a speculative guess out of thin air that the NCAA will ignore its own rule and tell Florida and Rioux that they are entitled to special treatment, perhaps on the advice of PK-WIKI that the NCAA should ignore its own rules. This literally comes from nowhere and is supported by nothing. It is a figment of PK-WIKI's imagination. The NCAA's track record of enforcement has been detailed above in a case involving a value less than that permissible for a championship ring. So, there is absolutely no basis for PK-WIKI to support his position, and, predictably, he has offered none. PK-WIKI has accused me of engaging in WP:OR, when my reasoning was based on a plain reading of the source document. Yet, he imagines that he is not engaging in original research, as he makes up speculative alternative facts that do not exist and are not supported by the only available source, which happens to be primary. PK-WIKI has cherry-picked material from Wikipedia's No original research page and then twisted facts to suit his needs. He left out: {{tqq|A primary source may be used on Wikipedia only to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge.}} The plain reading of the Manual I did above is exactly that. Any educated person can read the Manual and verify the fact that Rioux may not receive an award as a national champion, because he is not considered one by the NCAA, which admininsters the championshop, because he did not participate in competition during the season. No interpretation is required. In contrast, PK-WIKI would like to see Rioux in the national champion navbox without offering any reliable source as to why he should be there. Even if the primary source is ignored, leaving no source at all, should Rioux's name appear in the navbox simply because PK-WIKI wants it there? Should we all just let PK-WIKI go ahead and violate WP:MADEUP? Taxman1913 (talk) 22:54, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

:::You are accusing me of bludgeoning yet continue to post walls of text like that... The fact remains that your supposed "plain reading" of the NCAA document is up for interpretation and is exactly the behavior explicitly disallowed: {{tpq|"Wikipedians should never interpret the content of primary sources for themselves"}}.

:::As I recently posted to the CFB wikiproject, player [https://www.buckeyerosters.com/player/t-j-downing/ T.J. Downing] redshirted on the 2002 Ohio State Buckeyes football team that won the national championship. The national championship ring that this redshirt was awarded for the season (huh?!?!) became a central focus of the Tattoogate scandal a decade later and the ring's existence [https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-marion-star-tj-downing-national-ch/170017612/ is] [https://media.cleveland.com/metro/other/cicero-complaint.pdf well] [https://www.landgrantholyland.com/2013/6/7/4406590/ohio-state-terrelle-pryor-tattoo-for-memorabilia-scandal-auction-pictures#0 documented].

:::Since you previously posted {{tpq|"I believe that simple logic allows us to conclude that if a player cannot receive a championship ring under NCAA rules, such player is not considered an NCAA champion. Afterall, why would the NCAA consider the player a champion but deny the student-athlete a ring?"}}, I hope you'll agree that a redshirt player who did not play in any games actually being awarded a national championship ring seems to undercut your argument that they can't be awarded rings. PK-WIKI (talk) 23:39, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

::::PK-WIKI, even though this attempt on your part to throw something at the wall and see whether it sticks is WP:SYNTHESIS, since you're using a fact from the 2002 football season to draw a conclusion about the 2024–25 men's basketball season, I tracked down the relevant points to determine whether there some validity to such a conclusion. First, I confirmed from the 2003 Ohio State football media guide that Downing saw absolutely no action during the 2002 football season. This eliminates the possibility that he might have played early in the season, suffered an injury and qualified for a medical redshirt. He was just a straight-up optional redshirt during his freshman academic year. Next, I consulted the 2002–03 Division I Manual to determine whether the rules for awards were different. Here's what I found in section 16.1.1.2: {{tqq|The awards limitations of Bylaw 16.1 apply to awards received by a student-athlete while enrolled during the academic year (i.e., from the beginning of the fall term through completion of the spring term, including any intervening vacation period) as a regular student in a minimum full-time academic load, or awards received by a student-athlete while representing the student-athlete's institution at any other time. Such awards may not include cash, gift certificates, a cash-equivalent award (i.e., an item that is negotiable for cash or trade or other services, benefits or merchandise) for athletics participation, or a country club or sports club membership.}} Section 16.1.4.3 says: {{tqq|Awards for winning an individual or team conference or national championship may be presented each year, limited in value and number as specified in Figure 16-1. Awards for winning a conference or national championship in a team sport may be provided only to student-athletes who were eligible to participate in the championship event. The total value of any single award received for a conference or national championship may not exceed $300, and each permissible awarding agency is subject to a separate $300 limit per award. Each permissible awarding agency may provide only a single award for each championship to each student-athlete. Separate awards may be presented to both the regular-season conference champion and the postseason conference champion (with a separate $300 limitation), but if the same institution wins both the regular-season and postseason conference championship, the combined value of both awards shall not exceed $300.}}{{cite book|url=https://www.ncaapublications.com/productdownloads/MAN0203.pdf|title=2002–03 NCAA Division I Manual|publisher=National Collegiate Athletic Association|date=July 2002|access-date=April 10, 2025}}{{rp|199–200}} The phrase "participation in competition" does not appear in the 2002–03 Manual. A plain reading says that it was permissible for Downing to receive a ring if he was attending Ohio State full time and eligible to participate in the 2003 Fiesta Bowl, which we can take a leap of faith and assume that is what the NCAA means by "championship event", since the Division I-A championship was unofficial. The missing phrase "participation in competition" means that, even if we ignore the prohibtion against synthesizing, we cannot conclude that what happened after the 2002 football season will be repeated for the 2024–25 men's basketball season. The rules are different. We still have no source, a reliable secondary one or otherwise, that supports the notion that Rioux is a national champion. Further, since the phrase "participation in competition" now appears in the Manual, common sense leads to the conclusion that it was added with intent and that the NCAA really does plan to enforce it. Of course, that's an interpretive statement of a primary source on my part, and it cannot, therefore, be determinative. Nevertheless, we do not need to be blind to it. Taxman1913 (talk) 01:47, 11 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::{{tqq|You have still provided no reliable, third-party, secondary source saying that Olivier Rioux is not a national champion.}} While it might be more straightforward if such a source is found, it's also not necessarily reasonable to expect sources to exist stating everything that is potentially untrue. Ultimately, even with sources on either side, WP:ONUS is a a guiding policy: {{tq2|While information must be verifiable for inclusion in an article, not all verifiable information must be included. Consensus may determine that certain information does not improve an article, and other policies may indicate that the material is inappropriate. Such information should be omitted or presented instead in a different article.}} —Bagumba (talk) 05:55, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::Neutral point of view and No original research are also policies.

::::::::::It's trivially easy to provide citations that Rioux was an eligible freshman basketball player on the active roster of the team that won the NCAA national championship. WP:DUE weight would thus be to include him in the national championship navbox, annotate his page with the national champion highlight, etc. just like the other players on the team.

::::::::::Meanwhile, those on the other side of this argument have still provided ZERO reliable secondary sources even hinting at the fact that he should not be considered a national champion. Why are we even having this discussion without a single source posted that makes that accusation? PK-WIKI (talk) 07:53, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::{{tqq|Neutral point of view and No original research are also policies}}: And it's all decided by another policy, WP:CONSENSUS. —Bagumba (talk) 08:09, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::::Actually not: {{tpq|This policy is non-negotiable, and the principles upon which it is based cannot be superseded by other policies or guidelines, nor by editor consensus.}} PK-WIKI (talk) 08:20, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::::Sure. But how do we decide what is neutral? Consensus (unless it's so egregious that an admin would override it, but that wouldn't seem like the case here). —Bagumba (talk) 10:11, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::{{tqq|Meanwhile, those on the other side of this argument have still provided ZERO reliable secondary sources even hinting at the fact that he should not be considered a national champion. Why are we even having this discussion without a single source posted that makes that accusation?}} We have a primary source, the NCAA Division I Manual, which says Rioux is not entitled to awards for championship team members. PK-WIKI continues WP:BLUDGEONING, since there is also no reliable secondary source that says Rioux is a national champion, because the USA Today article is excluded by WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. There is also no reliable secondary source that say I, PK-WIKI or Donald Trump are not members of Florida's national championship team. Do the three of us belong in the navbox as well? Taxman1913 (talk) 15:38, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

::::::::::::It's trivially easy to cite that Oliver Rioux was one of 17 players on the Florida Gators basketball team active roster. It's also trivially easy to cite that you, I, or the president were not members of the team.

::::::::::::That basketball team just won the NCAA national championship. Ergo, members of the team are national champions. Wikipedia:You don't need to cite that the sky is blue. It's the very definition of the term in a team sport. Benchwarmers are national champions just like the starters.

::::::::::::If you're going to insist that the WP:SKYISRED, you need to produce something indicating doubt from a reliable secondary source. So far, no one has. In this entire thread no one has posted even the slimmest indication that Rioux should not be considered a national champion. Why are we having the conversation? Please provide a reliable secondary source indicating anything in that regard. PK-WIKI (talk) 17:15, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::::::::::PK-WIKI, it is you claiming the sky is red. It is trivially easy to cite that Rioux was on the roster. {{tqq|Ergo, members of the team are national champions.}} Can you provide a reliable secondary source to support that assertion? Can you provide a reliable secondary source that describes what is meant by "members of the team" in your statement? Of course, you cannot, because none exists. You are hoping to convince other editors to engage in WP:MADEUP. In the absence of any source, we don't simply put something on Wikipedia, just because there is no source proving it untrue. As I said above, we will not be able to find a source saying that you, I or Donald Trump were not 2025 NCAA men's basketball champions. We will also not find a source that definitively says Rioux was an NCAA champion. {{tqq|In this entire thread no one has posted even the slimmest indication that Rioux should not be considered a national champion.}} That statement is so far from the truth that it is laughable. It is another example of WP:BLUDGEONING by PK-WIKI. Taxman1913 (talk) 23:17, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

• If discussion here reaches an impasse and/or any editors believe this project is forming a WP:LOCALCONSENSUS contrary to site policies and guidelines, the options at WP:DR can be considered for wider community input. Left guide (talk) 05:34, 10 April 2025 (UTC)

• Comment on redshirt status I am going to say this one more time, because the same arguments are being repeated in walls of text. That coach Todd Golden “could have” played Rioux at any time is just not a valid argument at this point in time. Could the coach have played Rioux during the season? Yes. But we are past the end of the season (which is why we can say Florida are champions at all) and Golden did not do this, and in exchange he ensured that Rioux was not active this season, so instead is eligible for the 2028-29 season. The book is closed on the season, and Coach Golden’s actions ensured Rioux was not active on the roster for 2024-25. Arguing that he was active based on what could have happened but didn’t is not a sound argument and I’m not sure it’s even in good faith. Rikster2 (talk) 12:05, 10 April 2025 (UTC)
• :So at that final timeout in the NCAA national championship game, Rioux was just a normal freshman on the team. Todd Golden could have substituted him in for the final play. Rioux was eligible and on the active roster, just waiting for his chance. The clock ticks down 0:00 and the gators are NATIONAL CHAMPIONS. But also at that very second, Rioux becomes NOT a national champion because he didn't get 0:01 seconds of game time. He can't celebrate their national championship with his fellow benchwarmers who got 2:29 and 4:10 of garbage time back in November, scoring 0 points. The NCAA withholds his ring.
• :That's an interesting opinion, but it's WP:ORIGINAL RESEARCH. Please provide a reliable secondary source that supports your position. PK-WIKI (talk) PK-WIKI (talk) 17:40, 10 April 2025 (UTC)
• ::Congratulations, PK-WIKI, you have finally understood how it works. Rioux gets no ring and is not a national champion. It's not an opinion, and it's not original research. No secondary source has yet been found to either support or contradict it, but a primary source supports it by its plain language without the need for interpretation. So, we can just put this to bed now. Taxman1913 (talk) 23:22, 10 April 2025 (UTC)
• That’s just it, man. Rioux was NOT an active player this season, and his article is sourced that this was the coach’s plan since the first month of the season. The coach COULD have activated him at any time by inserting him into a game and chose not to, so it’s a moot point. That is how a redshirt works and if anything it is WP:OR to treat it differently. Almost a case of Wikipedia:You do need to cite that the sky is blue you might say. This discussion has gotten ridiculously long and repetitive and now I am going to choose not to be a part of it any longer. If some admin comes across this discussion and thinks this is actually some case of original research, then this site is further gone than I have begun to suspect. Rikster2 (talk) 18:43, 10 April 2025 (UTC)
• :Admins don't have any special power in content decisions. Just like other editors, individual admins sometimes have rogue viewpoints on certain issues that don't necessarily represent sitewide consensus. If they use their tools to enforce their view against consensus, then that's a problem, but otherwise it's fine. Left guide (talk) 19:15, 10 April 2025 (UTC)
• Since this whole wall of text above seems to be mostly about whether or not to include Rioux in the navbox, let me just say that this entire discussion is causing me to revisit my opinion on whether or not we should continue maintaining this entire class of national champion navboxes at all. In the past, I've always argued at TfD that, at least for college football and basketball, they were worth maintaining, but now I'm not so sure. Just go ahead and delete the navbox, and then we don't have to waste all our time arguing about whether to include Rioux in it or not. Ejgreen77 (talk) 19:17, 10 April 2025 (UTC)
• :@Ejgreen77: Wall of text aside, Template:2025 Florida Gators men's basketball navbox and Olivier Rioux have been stable. Consensus is often reached without unanimity, though it's good that WP:AGF discussions are attempted as part of dispute resolution.—Bagumba (talk) 01:04, 11 April 2025 (UTC)

The 2021–22 Kansas Jayhawks men's basketball team won the 2022 NCAA Division I men's basketball championship game on April 4, 2022. On October 13, 2022, before the next season, Kansas unveiled the previous team's [https://www2.kusports.com/news/2022/oct/13/banner-unveiling-ring-ceremony-be-focal-point-kans/ national championship banner] and [https://www.kansascity.com/sports/college/big-12/university-of-kansas/article267295557.html national championship rings] at the annual "Late Night in the Phog" event.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=brOc9cvZ4PA&t=140s The national championship ring presentation is available online.]

Head coach Bill Self begins the presentation by awarding national championship rings to four players who were members of the last year's 2021–2022 national championship team. Three of them had been eligible to play in any game that season, but did not record any game minutes. The fourth was an incoming transfer {{strikethrough|who was forced to sit out a year and was ineligible to play in the games.}} EDIT: The fourth was also eligible, as a grad transfer.

• Dillon Wilhite — Non-scholarship walk-on, [https://www.kansascity.com/sports/college/big-12/university-of-kansas/article255678476.html intentional redshirt season]; 0 minutes played in 2021–2022; [https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/players/dillon-wilhite-1.html 7, 14, and 23 minutes played] in the next 3 seasons.
• Lawrence Journal-World: [https://www2.kusports.com/sports/college/basketball-men/2025/mar/19/end-of-an-era-what-will-ku-basketball-lose-if-it-no-longer-has-walk-ons/ "Dillon Wilhite, a nonscholarship player from San Diego, who once earned a national championship ring as part of the 2021-22 Kansas team..."]
• Charlie McCarthy — [https://kuathletics.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster/charlie-mccarthy/986 Invited walk-on]; 0 minutes played in 2021–22... or in 2023, or 2024. Seemingly zero minutes played in entire college career (Ouch). Great-grandfather was Howard Engleman whose number 5 is retired by KU.
• The Desert Sun story: [https://www.desertsun.com/story/sports/high-school/basketball/2022/03/24/kansas-basketball-desert-grad-plays-key-role-teams-ncaa-tournament-run/7147023001/ "Desert grad plays key role for Kansas basketball during NCAA Tournament run"] - "McCarthy is a freshman guard on the Jayhawks' team and though he is redshirting this year and has not played, he has an important role."
• Kyle Cuffe Jr. — Scholarship player; [https://www.kansascity.com/sports/college/big-12/university-of-kansas/article255678476.html intentional redshirt season]; reclassified from 2022 to 2021; [https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/players/kyle-cuffejr-1.html 0 minutes played in 2021–2022].
• Syracuse.com interview: [https://www.syracuse.com/orangebasketball/2025/03/kyle-cuffe-graduation-interview-dunk-vs-layup-2-more-years-surrounded-by-sisters.html "For my freshman year I won a national championship. I was spoiled right from the get-go."]
• Cam Martin — {{strikethrough|Redshirt due to}} incoming transfer from Missouri Southern. {{strikethrough|Ineligible to play in games for Kansas.}} EDIT: Apparently was a [https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/2499773/2021/04/06/way-too-early-mens-college-basketball-top-25-gonzaga-michigan-and-ucla-lead-seth-davis-list/ grad transfer]; eligible but [https://www.kansascity.com/sports/college/big-12/university-of-kansas/article255748646.html intentionally decided] not to play and take a redshirt season.
• KOAM-TV News story: [https://www.koamnewsnow.com/sports/college-sports/cam-martin-returns-as-a-national-champion-helps-teach-and-inspire-local-athletes/article_ecf4c97c-93c5-56a0-a1d9-f876f191c733.html Cam Martin returns as a national champion, helps teach and inspire local athletes] - He redshirted last year and has one year of eligibility remaining. ... Martin’s continued perseverance has now earned him a national championship.
• Followed by rings for all of the other players on last year's team...

The [https://www.ncaapublications.com/productdownloads/D122.pdf 2021-22 NCAA Division I Manual]{{rp|236}} Awards section 16.1.1.2 does contain the same phrase {{tpq|"awards received by a student-athlete for participation in competition while representing the student-athlete's institution"}} (emphasis mine) that is still present in the current manual.

All four of these men have been awarded national championship rings that they earned as players on the NCAA tournament-winning national champion 2021–22 Kansas Jayhawks men's basketball team.

The rings were awarded in exactly the same manner, with no differentiation from, and in the very same presentation, as the rings awarded to the team's star players, starters, substitutes, and benchwarmers. They were all members of the same national championship team, after all. Accordingly, these four should be noted as national champions in all places where Ochai Agbaji (Kansas's Final Four Most Outstanding Player) is given that markup. Current article Cam Martin should be added to Template:2022 Kansas Jayhawks men's basketball navbox and denoted as a redshirt {{strikethrough|due to transfer}}. PK-WIKI (talk) 09:42, 12 April 2025 (UTC)

:Re: Kyle Cuffe Jr., a player calling himself "national champion" in an interview isn't very useful because it's unduly self-serving. WP:ABOUTSELF #1 permits self-verification only when {{tq2|The material is neither unduly self-serving nor an exceptional claim}} Better to have independent sources for that one. Left guide (talk) 09:53, 12 April 2025 (UTC)

::Disagree that Cuffe stating that he won a national championship is "unduly self-serving" or an "exceptional claim". Every existing reliable source places him on the active roster of the team that won the team-sport national championship. He was awarded a national championship ring for winning the national championship, exactly the same as every other member of his team. No "prevailing view within the relevant community" can be found that cast doubt on his statement. PK-WIKI (talk) 17:29, 1 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Every single source says Cuffe was a redshirt that year and was granted another year of eligibility by the sport’s governing body (the NCAA) specifically because he was held out that entire season. Ergo, he was not “active” on the roster. This is indisputable. Teams can give rings to whomever they want, that’s not proof of a national championship for that player. If the U of Houston had won and decided to give a ring to Hakeem Olajuwon or Jim Nance (not a stretch of the imagination) that doesn’t make them active members of the team. Rikster2 (talk) 21:26, 1 May 2025 (UTC)

::::The NCAA can give out another year of eligibility to whomever they want, that’s not not proof of a national championship for that player. PK-WIKI (talk) 21:51, 1 May 2025 (UTC)

{{Reflist-talk}}

File:Symbol watching blue lashes high contrast.svg You are invited to join the discussion at :Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Are 'Sports-Reference.com' websites reliable sources for redshirt seasons and awards?. PK-WIKI (talk) 17:53, 15 April 2025 (UTC)

Hello everyone, I’ve been editing the Awards and honors section of his page and I’m need your guys' help in determining how to write out some of his NCAA accomplishments. He played in the Pacific Conference, but it was called the AAWU in his 1966–67 and 1967–68 seasons, then changed to the Pac-8 conference in 1968. It is currently called the Pac-12. My question is whether I should group them together into one name. For example, 3x Pac-8 regular season champion instead of 2x AAWU regular season champion and 1969 Pac-8 champion separated. This question also applies to his All-Pac-8 team selections and seasonal scoring/rebounding leader. Please keep in mind that he’s also been inducted into the "Pac-12 Hall of Honor", "Pac-12 All-Century team", and was named "Pac-12 Player of the 20th Century" before making your decision. In my personal opinion it would be confusing for the casual reader to see "AAWU regular season champion", then "Pac-8 regular season champion", and "Pac-12 Hall of Honor". I was thinking of ensuring uniformity by just naming them all "Pac-12" and just leaving a note mentioning the expansion and change in conference name at the top or something. Let me know your thoughts on what you think I should do, thanks in advance. GOAT Bones231012 (talk) 09:25, 26 April 2025 (UTC)

:"3x Pac-8" is fine for simplifying display, while adding an explanatory footnote that it includes some seasons in the AAWU, which became the Pac-8. For references to modern day Pac-12 (e.g. current records, current awards, etc.) use "Pac-12" with a footnote that the Pac-8 eventually became the Pac-12. This balances the needs of casual readers with experts familiar with the chronology of the conference's names. —Bagumba (talk) 15:39, 26 April 2025 (UTC)

::@Bagumba please see my edit here and let me know what you think. GOAT Bones231012 (talk) 21:56, 26 April 2025 (UTC)

:::I agree with Bagumba. All over this project, there are NCAA University Division tournament champions called Division I champions, even though Division I did not yet exist. It's just a name change.

:::I would go with a shorter footnote: e.g. The Pacific-8 Conference was known as the Athletic Association of Western Universities prior to the 1968–69 season. I would also consistently use Pacific-8, not Pac-8. While the conference's current official name is Pac-12 (not Pacific-12), its prior two official names were Pacific-10 and Pacific-8. For most of the run of the Pacific-10 name, Pac-10 was very common and could easily be found in reliable secondary sources. I do believe that Pac-8 was getting used prior to Arizona and Arizona State joining, but I doubt it was common in 1969. Taxman1913 (talk) 23:54, 26 April 2025 (UTC)

::::And so do you think the note I put by "Pac-12 records" is still necessary or should I take it out completely? Or, should I change it to something like "The Pac-12 Conference was previously known as the Athletic Association of Western Universities and Pacific-8 Conference." GOAT Bones231012 (talk) 00:14, 27 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::I gave you my suggested footnote above. I think it is helpful to readers to have a note there. I think one sentence explaining there was a name change and when it took place is sufficient. Taxman1913 (talk) 00:28, 27 April 2025 (UTC)

::::I did a search of some October 1968 newpaper articles. The term Pac-8 was being used in headlines and, in some articles, as the second reference to the conference. I did find some newspaper articles that exclusively used Pacific-8. Taxman1913 (talk) 00:25, 27 April 2025 (UTC)

::::@GOAT Bones231012: I agree with Taxman1913 that the footnotes can be shortened. I took a stab at it. Feel free to alter if it's too cryptic. Someone clicking on the Pac-12 footnote might not have read the earlier note on AAWU, so it doesnt seem to need mention again. —Bagumba (talk) 02:00, 27 April 2025 (UTC)

:::::Agreed, appreciate the touch up. GOAT Bones231012 (talk) 02:25, 27 April 2025 (UTC)

File:Symbol watching blue lashes high contrast.svg You are invited to join the discussion at Template talk:Infobox basketball biography § Linking field titles. —Bagumba (talk) 04:31, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

File:Symbol watching blue lashes high contrast.svg You are invited to join the discussion at Template talk:Infobox basketball biography § Edit request 5 May 2025, which is within the scope of this WikiProject. Left guide (talk) 04:38, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

At long last, I've gotten the infobox to work as previously proposed. The effect of sandbox changes made to the team infobox can be seen on the testcases page.

;Summary of changes

New bestfinish parameter

A new parameter called bestfinish has been added. When the changes are made, users will be advised in the documentation to enter 1 for national championship, 2 for national runner-up, 3 for national third-place, 4 for final four, or 8 for elite eight. Since some users may be ambitious and enter 16 for sweet 16, 32 for round of 32 or 64 for round of 64, these parameters are entered in the test cases for Montana, Fairleigh Dickinson and Alabama State to ensure such entries won't break anything. The parameter and related coding are designed to only give special handling where 1, 2, 3, 4 or 8 are entered. Otherwise, the special handling guided by the parameter is ignored, and the infobox will be rendered as it is now with the live template. Users will be advised in the documentation that the bestfinish patameter is only for the Division I (or predecessor) tournament. If a team's best finish in the Division I tournament is final four, entering 4 for bestfinish will not prevent the national championship fields from displaying, should such team have won a Division II or III national championship. It will show under the Other NCAA tournament results collapsible section, which is further described below. Finally, users will be advised that, when entering the bestfinish parameter, they must have data entered in the parameter that correlates to such bestfinish. For instance, if 3 is entered as the bestfinish there must be an entry in the new NCAAthirdplace parameter, which is described below. If the bestfinish parameter is not entered in the infobox template, no collapsible section is created, and the infobox generally displays as it does now, aside from any changes mentioned below. This can be seen in the Citadel test case, since Citadel has never been to the NCAA tournament.

New NCAAthirdplace parameter

Since there were many third-place games played in past NCAA tournaments, a parameter has been created to allow it to be displayed in the infobox. Since it has been so long since a third-place game was played, this is out of mind for many. It can obviously be left off. However, for some schools, including Texas, this is the true best finish. The parameters NCAAthirdplace and bestfinish have been entered for Texas in the test cases to show how this would appear.

Addressing clutter caused by NCAAsecondround parameter

Red0ctober22 noticed that, after the last significant change to the template, there was still some clutter in infoboxes for some women's teams using the NCAAsecondround parameter. This has now been moved into the shared section of the infobox so that, if the NCAAsweetsixteen parameter is present, the related data will be displayed, and data for the round of 32 and second round will be ignored. If NCAAsweetsixteen is empty, any data shown for NCAAroundof32 will be displayed. If NCAAsweetsixteen and NCAAroundof32 are both empty, data in NCAAsecondround will be displayed. The First Four data also no longer displays, if there is an entry in NCAAsweetsixteen, NCAAroundof32 or NCAAsecondround. This can all be seen in the test cases for Tennessee, Monmouth and Duquesne women.

Order of AIAW and NAIA information

I don't know whether there is a team that participated in both AIAW and NAIA women's tournaments. Perhaps it will show up someday in an article not yet created. Nevertheless, it made no sense that NAIA results showed in the infobox above AIAW results. I reversed the order. If anyone knows of an example, please add it to the test cases.

Grammar correction

The header formerly called Conference regular season champions is now called Conference regular-season champions.

Please take a good, hard look at the test cases, and let me know whether you think we should make the coding in the sandbox live. Taxman1913 (talk) 22:10, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

• Support: Everything looks good in the sandbox and testcases, and seems ready to go live. And thank you {{u|Taxman1913}} for all of your hard work helping to tackle a complex problem; you deserve a barnstar. Left guide (talk) 22:22, 6 May 2025 (UTC)
• :@Left guide Thanks. My first edit on Wikipedia was more than 17 years ago, and I have never received a barnstar.
• :I'd consider myself a pretty good but not great template editor. So, this was a challenge for me. The collapsible feature kept breaking the template as I went along, and it took a while to figure out why. I finally cracked the case today. This was my first time inserting a collapsible section into an infobox, and it is only conditionally collapsible. I knew how I wanted it to look, and I'm relieved I got there.
• :I believe you and perhaps others thought it might be a good idea to reduce the size of the conference regular-season and tournament championship sections for teams that have a large number of entries. I believe it would be pretty easy to give users the option to make these collapsible. Do you think I should take a crack at it? Taxman1913 (talk) 22:48, 6 May 2025 (UTC)

:I've added two more parameters that when invoked will collapse the conference tournament and conference regular-season championship sections.

:If collapseconftour is invoked by entering y for that parameter, that section will load collapsed. If collapseconfregsea is invoked by entering y for the parameter, that section will load collapsed. If y is entered for both parameters, they will both load collapsed. On the testcases, I have invoked the parameter for Duke's conference tournament titles, Purdue's regular-season titles and both of Alabama's conference title sections. This appears to be working well whether none, one or both of the parameters are invoked.

:I don't think there are many pages on which we would want to invoke these options. I wouldn't do it for Alabama with only two lines of text in each section. However, some teams have detail beyond simply the years entered. I invoked the collapse option for the Emporia State test case, and it works well with all the details preserved. Taxman1913 (talk) 00:00, 7 May 2025 (UTC)

:While the template is being updated, I created two more parameters that solve a problem that arises when there is a group of footnotes in the infobox and one or more groups of footnotes elsewhere in the article.

:If there is a group of footnotes in the infobox and another group of footnotes elsewhere in the article, and the notelist template is used to show the notes for the infobox group in a Notes section at the bottom of the article, and the notelist template is also used to show the other group of footnotes within the other section of the article, the group of footnotes in the infobox will be rendered the first time the notelist template appears, i.e. in the other section of the article, where they make no sense at all. This can be avoided by having all footnotes appear in a section at the bottom of the article. This emasculates the ability to use the group parameter in the various notes templates, which may adversely impact the overall clarity of the article.

:Another way to solve this problem is to make sure the group of notes relevant to the infobox display before the next group elsewhere in the article. However, there isn't a conventient place to put this outside the infobox. It would look odd if placed at the end of the lede. I solved this problem by creating a Notes section in the infobox for Le Moyne Dolphins men's basketball. I figure that rather than expecting users to figure out how to do that, why not provide a way for the template to accommodate it?

:So, if a user places footnotes within a named group in the infobox, there is now a parameter called notegroup. If a user enters the name of the group of notes, the notes will display at the bottom of the infobox. If the collapsenotes parameter is activated, the Notes section will load in a collapsed state. I added Le Moyne as an example in the testcases with the new parmeter used and the Notes section collapsed. I also added an uncollapsed footnote to Texas to show how it looks. This doesn't appear to have adversely affected anything else. Taxman1913 (talk) 05:33, 7 May 2025 (UTC)

:This looks great, and thanks for taking care of that specific issue of the second round with the women's teams. Additionally, thank you for your hard work in developing this great system for the infobox, I wouldn't even know where to start when editing the coding of a template like that. Red0ctober22 (talk) 14:41, 7 May 2025 (UTC)

:I'm working on updating the documentation for the template, and I realize there are two choices for the label in the infobox for the type of institution: university and college. This fits nearly every team but doesn't really work for Army, Navy, Air Force, VMI, Georgia Tech and Virginia Tech. I'm adding a third parameter called institution that will make the label the generic institution, which is what the NCAA uses. Since that word is a catch-all, I think it should suffice. This is preferable to adding academy and institute and then wondering whether anything else has been missed.

:The documentation as it stands now is a bit lacking. It makes it appear as though university is the only choice. However, the coding already includes an option to make the label say college. Taxman1913 (talk) 15:07, 7 May 2025 (UTC)

::This is done. I added VMI to the testcases to show how it looks. Taxman1913 (talk) 15:20, 7 May 2025 (UTC)

The infobox template has been changed to reflect the improvements described in the preceding section of this page. The documentation for the template has been modified to add the new parameters created and also to make the descriptions more robust than they were.

Unlike the changes I made about three weeks ago, these edits do nothing to immediately reduce clutter in infoboxes. All they do is enable the reduction of clutter for successful teams by using the bestfinish, collapseconftour and collapseconfregsea parameters. If we want to see reduction of clutter in infoboxes on live pages, volunteers will need to add the parameters to team articles as appropriate. Most teams that have reached the Elite Eight or better will benefit from adding the bestfinish parameter. We can expect it to be likely that these same teams likely have a large number of entries in the conference tournament champion and conference regular-season champion sections and can be improved by collapsing one or both of those sections. Anyone wh has a passionate distaste for infobox clutter, now is your chance to do something about it without any data getting deleted, which we have seen upsets many users. Taxman1913 (talk) 17:59, 7 May 2025 (UTC)

:I [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=UCLA_Bruins_men%27s_basketball&diff=prev&oldid=1289333127 implemented "bestfinish"] on UCLA Bruins men's basketball; loving the more streamlined upfront look paired with customizability accommodating those who want to see all results. I don't mind going around to some more team pages when I have time. Left guide (talk) 23:50, 7 May 2025 (UTC)

:I've now carried out the changes on all pertinent team articles from {{tl|Big Ten Conference men's basketball navbox}}. Left guide (talk) 01:02, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

::@Left guide I collapsed the conference regular-season championships section on Purdue. I think it's an improvement. Taxman1913 (talk) 02:09, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Ok, I'm not as familiar with the parameters for collapsing conference champ material, and haven't tracked all of the recent project discussions here (some are rather long), but I'll see what I can do when I have a chance. I've been checking some of your recent edits to learn and see how it works. Left guide (talk) 05:32, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

::@Left guide I implemented the parameter on all the ACC teams. Taxman1913 (talk) 04:01, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

::I'm a purist. If it's unimportant enough to collapse, make an editorial decision to just remove it. Per MOS:COLLAPSE: {{tq2|If information in a list, infobox, or other non-navigational content seems extraneous or trivial enough to inspire pre-collapsing it, consider raising a discussion on the article (or template) talk page about whether it should be included at all.}} Visually, I also find it tacky to have a colored header that is collapsed. If it muuust stay, can we uncolor that row somehow, making it less jarring to have consecutive colored rows? Perhaps include the "other results" collapsed within the highest finish.—Bagumba (talk) 05:43, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

:::{{tqq|If it's unimportant enough to collapse, make an editorial decision to just remove it.}} That sounds nice on paper, but were you aware that this exact thing was attempted, and then met with extremely heavy pushback on this project page from many readers and editors when the parameters were first removed? Left guide (talk) 06:08, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

::::A camel is a horse designed by committee. But I did offer some alternatives. —Bagumba (talk) 07:26, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

:::@Bagumba Thanks for your feedback. I'll address each of the points you raised, but it will result in a lengthy comment.

:::The decision to collapse the data was not made because the content was viewed as extraneous or trivial. As a result of the discussion that got us here, there was consensus that some information the infobox was displaying was, in fact, extraneous or trivial for some teams, but not for others. For instance, it is hard to imagine users care very much how many round of 32 appearances Duke, North Carolina, Kansas and Kentucky have. However, round of 32 appearances are not extraneous or trivial for Fairleigh Dickinson. The modification to the coding made three weeks ago addresses that. If we look at Fairleigh Dickinson's page, we see their round of 32 appearance. If we look at the other four teams mentioned, they no longer show up; that is the case with or without the collapsible feature invoked.

:::There was a lot of feedback on this page from folks who do not ordinarily pay attention to what goes on here, when attempts were made to remove data that some thought extraneous or trivial. It isn't unreasonable to say that the only things truly important enough to display regarding the NCAA tournament are titles, Final Four appearances and total appearances. However, after reading the comments, it became abundantly clear that readers, including those who rarely or never edit on Wikipedia, rely on the team infoboxes as quick-reference tools. One commenter mentioned checking the infoboxes while watching tournament games to see how far teams have gone in the past. Of course, some might believe that the tournament is such a significant event that every achievement is notable enough to mention in the infobox, and that view at the other end of the spectrum is not unreasonable either. A compromise was reached that eliminated the display of early-round information for teams that have been to the Sweet 16. This consensus was reached primarily by discussion among those who frequently pay attention to this project while remaining sensitive to those who don't. Since deleting data initially considered extraneous or trivial had resulted in reversions, changes were implemented by changing the coding of the infobox itself.

:::Having resolved what needs to be in the infobox and what does not, a separate discussion ensued regarding how large some of the infoboxes were. There was a desire to keep the information in the box, since it is clearly widely used, but make the box itself smaller on initial load. Thus, the solution was to create a collapsible section of the infobox in which all this information would be rendered. Based on the entries existing on the many pages using this template, it was impossible to be sure that a change in the coding to force this display would be appropriate. For example, if a team reached the Division II Final Four in the past, it likely has entries in that field. The same team might have a Division I Sweet 16 appearance, and that is truly its most notable tournament result. Therefore, human intervention is needed to make sure each team's most notable result appears prominently, i.e. uncollapsed, in the infobox. For that reason, a separate parameter was introduced, and collapsibility only occurs, when that parameter is properly activated. The driver behind this was to improve the cosmetic appearance of the infobox, not to hide content that is extraneous or trivial.

:::Having accomplished this for NCAA tournament results, I noticed that, in some cases, the infobox could be shrunk even more by making the counference tournament championship and conference regular-season championship sections optionally collapsible. Of course, we would not want to do this by default. It makes no sense to collapse the one regular-season conference title won by Citadel in the 1920s. It wouldn't even save space. Duke's many ACC tournament titles are just as notable, but they don't need to be displayed on initial page load. We know from feedback that readers want this information in the infobox. For those who don't, they need not uncollapse the section.

:::In developing the coding to produce the collapsible feature, the collapsible sections at first appeared with a default plain background. This is because the coding that collapses the section ignores the default for the infobox template, which is, of course, based on team colors. It looked visually unappealing to me to have one plain header in the middle of several others in team colors. Some people prefer rum raisin ice cream, while others are loyal to rocky road. I endured the pain to make the changes that would allow the team colors to be used for the collapsed sections. Since I don't want to force your or my favorite flavor on everyone, I removed the color from the Other NCAA tournament results section for teams that have won a national championship in the sandbox. Folks can see this by looking at the Duke infobox in the testcases. I have to say, I'm still not feeling it with the lack of color in the collapsed section. It makes it look less like a section header and more like a line of data. Nevertheless, if there is consensus to remove the color from the collapsed headers, I'll do it.

:::Including the other NCAA tournament results within the section containing the team's best finish would take a lot of coding work. I don't think I'm great at this; I'm just okay. It was difficult for me to get this done, and I'm pretty happy I finished it. That being said, if there is consensus to change the appearance to have just one NCAA tournament section containing all the relevant data, I'll endeavor to make that happen. Implementing this change would be a major undertaking, so it would have to be clear to me that most people firmly believe that it would be an improvement worthy of the effort it would take. The header would need to change, and I don't think that provides the best initial information to readers on page load. For instance, we could not leave the header for Duke saying NCAA tournament champions but have information other than that in the section. The header would need to say NCAA tournament results followed by a subheader saying NCAA tournament champions followed by the years they won titles and finally a collpased list of data with a subheader saying Other NCAA tournament results. The net effect would be that the infobox would be one line longer on initial collapsed page load than it is right now for any team that has reached the Elite Eight or better.

:::I apologize for the wall of text, but I wanted to give the points you raised the response they deserve. Taxman1913 (talk) 16:44, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

::::@Taxman1913: Thanks for the response, though I'm feeling guilty for the time you had to invest in it. I do hope my feedback resonates with others, or inspires an idea (or two), but I can also accept if I end up being the lone wolf (wouldn't be the first time). It certainly wasn't meant as a personal criticism. Thanks for investing your time in this. —Bagumba (talk) 17:19, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::@Bagumba I didn't take it as a personal criticism at all. The points you raised make a lot of sense and should be addressed openly. No one owns the infobox.

:::::I'm going to need to reverse the change I made in the sandbox a few hours ago in order to work on implementing the suggestion made below by PK-WIKI. So the color will return to the header for Duke's other tournament results. Once I have that sorted, I will remmove the color again, so folks have a chance to assess the difference in appearance. Taxman1913 (talk) 18:20, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

In the new infobox, we now have a {{tpq|Other NCAA tournament results}} header followed by {{tpq|NCAA tournament runner-up}}, {{tpq|NCAA tournament Final Four}}, {{tpq|NCAA tournament Elite Eight}}, {{tpq|NCAA tournament Sweet Sixteen}}, {{tpq|NCAA tournament appearances}}, etc.

See here: UCLA Bruins men's basketball

The "NCAA tournament" part is already included in the header. Can those fields be simplified to just "Final Four", "Elite Eight", etc.? PK-WIKI (talk) 17:03, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

:@PK-WIKI That is an awesome suggestion that I think would be a great visual improvement. The coding that produces the "other" sections is complex and differs depending on how far the team has gone in the tournament. So, it cannot be changed with a single stroke of a pen. The change isn't difficult, but it needs to be done in several places. I'll get on it in the sandbox. It is hard to imagine anyone would object to removing this redundancy you've pointed out. Taxman1913 (talk) 18:15, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

:@PK-WIKI Your suggestion has been implemented in the sandbox. The results can be seen in the testcases for Texas, Duke, Purdue, BYU, Alabama and Tennessee ladies. Please take a look and let your voice be heard. Pinging Red0ctober22, Left guide and Bagumba here for feedback. Unless I hear otherwise, I think this is a slam dunk to simply implement this change. It reduces clutter within the infobox and even make some boxes smaller. For instance, the Tennessee women's box is now six rows shorter when uncollapsed. Taxman1913 (talk) 18:43, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

:The principle of this change is definitely reasonable to me. I don't have the interest, time, or template literacy to explore the template/coding aspects of it, but salute those who do. Left guide (talk) 23:59, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

::@Left guide This change has been implemented and should show up on all live pages with bestrecord activated. It looks a lot better.

::I implemented bestrecord for all the SEC men's teams and collapsed thier conference title sections where appropriate. For clarification, when I said I completed the ACC yesterday, I only meant the men's teams. Taxman1913 (talk) 00:14, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

::Current list of pages (men's teams only thus far) on which bestfinish has been implemented:

::* ACC

::* Big Ten

::* Mountain West

::* NEC

::* Patriot

::* SEC

::* SoCon

::* Southland

::Taxman1913 (talk) 02:20, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

:::{{yo|Taxman1913}} Which/how many conferences are left? Left guide (talk) 02:47, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Also an update that I did the infobox collapses on relevant team articles at {{tl|Atlantic Coast Conference women's basketball navbox}}. Left guide (talk) 12:14, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

::::@Left guide There are 31 Division I basketball conferences x 2 genders = 62.

::::So far, 8 men's + 1 women's conferences are done = 9

::::So, 62 - 9 = 53 remaining. Taxman1913 (talk) 14:00, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

::::@Left guide

::::Update: Conferences now done:

::::Men

::::*A10

::::*ACC

::::*AmEast

::::*American

::::*ASUN

::::*Big Sky

::::*Big South

::::*Big Ten

::::*Big West

::::*CAA

::::*CUSA

::::*Ivy

::::*MAAC

::::*MVC

::::*Mountain West

::::*NEC

::::*OVC

::::*Patriot

::::*SEC

::::*SoCon

::::*Southland

::::*Sun Belt

::::*WCC

::::Women

::::*ACC

::::Taxman1913 (talk) 17:39, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::{{yo|Taxman1913}} Ok thanks for the updates, are there any lists/categories/navboxes to reference that show all 31 conferences for either or both genders? That would make it easier to know what's available. I can also paste such a list here for us to mark individual conferences as "done" to collectively keep track and see what's left. Left guide (talk) 17:42, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::@Left guide The shortest path I can think of is to go to 2024–25 NCAA Division I men's basketball season#Conference standings. The standings for all 31 conferences are there. The first few are done. So, if you get to the Big 12, Houston is listed first. Clicking on Houston will take you to their 2024–25 season article. At the top of the infobox on that page, there should be a link to their team article. Once you're there, you'll have a Big 12 navbox at the bottom of the page.

::::::Earlier today, I did several smaller conferences with few teams that have made deep tournament runs. However, many of them have changed conferences several times and have a lot of detail in their conference regular-season and tournament sections. So, I collapsed those that were four lines or longer.

::::::There is no article for New Haven yet. They just announced their move up to D-I this week. They'll play in the NEC, which I follow closely. So, I'll take a look once someone writes the article.

::::::Once the men's teams are done, 2024–25 NCAA Division I women's basketball season#Conference standings can be used as a checklist for the women in the same manner. Taxman1913 (talk) 18:54, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::There are 883 pages that link to the infobox.

::::::There were 364 Division I men's and 362 women's teams last season. VMI and Citadel don't have women's teams. That makes 364 + 362 = 726.

::::::If we get all the Division I teams, there are still 883 - 726 = 157 other pages using the template.

::::::Some may be former D-I teams, particularly notable non-D-I teams or foreign teams. Taxman1913 (talk) 19:11, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::I went through the entire list of pages that link to the template and addressed all those that are in the article namespace and not for Division I teams. Many of the pages were in users' sandboxes etc. I placed several notability tags on teams that really do not merit articles.

::::::So, once we are done with all the Division I teams, we will have hit everything. Taxman1913 (talk) 22:30, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

From those test cases, Texas's single "NCAA tournament third place" best finish in 1947 kind of now hides the fact that they also reached the Final Four in 1943 and 2003. Those finishes are roughly equivalent in level/prestige to the third place finish so I don't think they should be hidden below the fold or fully separated from the third place finish.

Maybe something like {{tpq|"Final Four: 1943, 1947^3rd, 2003"}} instead?. PK-WIKI (talk) 20:12, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

:@PK-WIKI Unfortunately, there is no simple way to automate what you're suggesting within the template. I'm sure the entries in the third-place and Final Four parameters can be parsed to search for identical entries and then add superscript as you have. However an entire module to do that would have to be written outside the template and then called to get it done. Personally, I don't have the skill set to get it accomplished, and there are so few instances in which it would be used, I doubt it is worth anyone's time. It would be faster for those who dislike the presentation to go into each affected article and make the changes manually.

:The third-place parameter was added with the change made to the coding yesterday. It is listed in the documentation as an optional parameter. So, editors don't need to enter the information for third-place finishes, if they prefer not to do so. Currently, it is not in the live Texas page. The third-place data was added to the Texas test case to make sure the coding was working properly, and there is a note at the bottom of the infobox on the test case page indicating that.

:There are multiple options available for the page for Texas or any other team with a similar situation:

:# Don't mention the third-place finish in the infobox. This is the present state of the live Texas page. Once it becomes common knowledge that the third-place parameter is available, I don't know whether folks will add it. Given that team's large fanbase, I presume there are a few people who pay attention to that page. They can decide what they want to do about it.

:# Use the third-place parameter in the infobox, but don't activate the collapse feature. This will show the Final Four finishes in a separate uncollapsed section immediately below the third-place finish. You can see what this looks like by removing 3 from the coding for bestfinish in the Texas infobox on the testcases page. It will look as it would have two days ago, before the collapse feature was introduced.

:# Use only the Final Four parameter and put an asterisk (or some other mark) next to the year of the third-place finish with an explanatory note below.

:# Not recommended: Enter 4 for the besfinish parameter instead of 3. This will show the third-place finish and Final Four years in separate ucollapsed sections on initial page load with all the results other than the Final Four, including the third-place finish, showing in the collapsed "other" section. This means the third-place finish would show up twice, which is silly. Of course, the infobox would also be larger on initial page load, which is undesirable.

:# Decide that winning a third-place game after losing a Final Four game is objectively better than losing a Final Four game and either going home or losing a third-place game. The coding used in the Texas test case reflects this. Anyone who sees a third-place finish on initial page load can quickly conclude that the team has at least one Final Four appearance and find out how many and which years by uncollapsing the section.

:I hope this makes things clearer. Taxman1913 (talk) 23:12, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

{{yo|Taxman1913}} et al. On some of the women's pages like Tennessee Lady Volunteers basketball, there are several parameters for results of the AIAW women's basketball tournament. IMO, these have the same "clutter" symptoms as the other parameters we've reached consensus on. What should be done about this? Left guide (talk) 01:29, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:@Left guide Please see the section below that i added 27 minutes ago.

:Working on it. Taxman1913 (talk) 01:45, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

Having gone through many team pages to implement the shrinking of the infoboxes, I found a few that have lengthy lists of AIAW or NAIA tournament results.

The data fields for the NCAA tournament could be used for Division II or III results. Therefore, collapsing them automatically could have obscured a Division I Final Four appearance, because the team had a Division III runner-up finish. It was for this reason that an option to collapse results was built into the template coding, requiring human intervention to emply.

The NAIA tournament had a stretch during which Division I and II tournaments were held. The AIAW tournament had Division I, II and III tournaments for several years as well. I am far less concerned about obscuring an NAIA Division I semifinal appearance, because there are data entered for an NAIA Division II championship. The NCAA experienced tremendous growth in the 1950s and again in 1976, fueled by NAIA teams joining. Even before that, it was clear the NAIA tournament did not include a field as good as either the NCAA tournament or the NIT. I could be convinced that the 1937 NAIA tournament is notable, but the inaugural NIT attracted a better field the following year.

I've come across a single notation of "Division II" in a data field for AIAW tournament results. Given the relatively short life of the AIAW tournament, it is doubtful that automatically collapsing lesser results will obscure a Division I finish in favor of a Division II or III result.

Therefore, I propose to adjust the coding of the template to automatically collapse redundant NAIA and AIAW results below the best result. The number of articles this affects is small. However, leaving it the way it is creates an inconsistency with what has been done with the NCAA tournament. I implemented the collapse feature on a page today, and I was left with a long string of NAIA results, and it didn't look right.

If anyone objects to this or has a better suggestion, please state your case. Taxman1913 (talk) 01:02, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:After reading the articles a little bit, it looks like for women, the AIAW tourney was the direct predecessor and equivalent of the NCAA tourney. With that in mind, shall we just merge the AIAW parameters into their respective NCAA ones? So for example, instead of saying "NCAA tournament Final Four", it would say "NCAA/AIAW tournament Final Four". This would greatly reduce the infobox length and number of visible parameters while keeping all of the data intact. Left guide (talk) 01:56, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::I apologize for missing a lot of what is going on here, but I'll offer this. Merging the AIAW and NCAA would definitely be great in terms of length and practicality, but I just feel that there is enough of a distinct difference between the two that they should remain separate. After all, the AIAW had teams like Immaculata and West Chester competing, teams today in D3 and D2, respectively. (And while as a Chester County resident I proudly celebrate those two schools accomplishments), they are obviously not on the level that teams like UConn or South Carolina are today. Ultimately though, if people want it merged, I don't think it would be the worst thing in the world.

::As for NAIA, I honestly find counting it on an infobox to be a waste of time, but I haven't really studied the history of the NAIA tournament that much, so I am not totally sure.

::Otherwise I like the changes that continue to be made, I just have one thing, can we get rid of the hyphen in "regular-season"? The term "regular season" is almost never used with a hyphen. Red0ctober22 (talk) 03:17, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Also had one other thing that might have been answered already—how will the "best finish" work on a team with both NCAA tournament championships and pre-tournament championships? Should we consider merging and maybe adding a symbol for pre-tournament titles? Red0ctober22 (talk) 03:23, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::::@Red0ctober22 I don't support this. Pre-tournament-era championships were awarded retroactively, often decades after the seasons occurred. Even if they had been contemporaneous, they are simply not the same thing as winning a tournament. Combining them elevates these mythical championships to the same level as the NCAA tournament.

::::Relatively few pages have pre-tournament championships. I've noticed some that should not be on pages. For instance, LIU Sharks men's basketball shows mythical championships from 1939 and 1941, despite the header saying "pre-tournament". Since the first tournament was in 1939, there should be no year entered in these infoboxes later than 1938. Aside from the header saying "pre-tournament", the documentation for the template says clearly that for men's teams, these parameters are for championships before 1939. We can reduce some infobox clutter by removing data after 1938.

::::While there is much sentimentality connected to the NIT, I think the tournament as esteemed in its early years, and that slowly eroded over time. While there were still teams snubbing the NCAA tournament for the NIT in the early 1970s, this had already become rare. As the NCAA tournament expanded over the years, the quality of the NIT was diluted. Nevertheless, if the mythical championships awarded in the early years of the NCAA tournament are worth anything, they tell us that experts in the 1940s usually felt the NCAA tournament champ was a better team than the NIT champ. The dispute over this was the reason these organizations bothered selecting champions after the NCAA tournament was being played. It really wasn't clear to folks that the winner of the tournament was truly the best team.

::::These retoractive selections are an important part of college basketball history. However, if we're saying "pre-tournament" on the infobox, we should mean it. That means removing anything on a men's page that says a year after 1938. In the cae of the two mythical post-1938 championships claimed by LIU, they won the NIT in both of those years. That was certainly a big deal in the first and third years in which the NCAA tournament was played, but it's not the equivalent of winning an NCAA tournament. Taxman1913 (talk) 08:14, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::I agree with that, I was just concerned that for a team like Kansas, their pre tournament championships would show up as their best finish rather than their actual NCAA tournament championships since the pre-tournament parameter is ordered first on the infobox. Red0ctober22 (talk) 14:18, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::@Red0ctober22 As I was writing my comment above, the thought occurred to me to suggest moving these down the ladder. However, that thought never got into the comment and has returned to me now.

::::::I think I will do that. Those championships are clearly less prominent. I am going to move them down below AIAW titles. Taxman1913 (talk) 15:00, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:::Hyphens pulled, good catch, thanks. Left guide (talk) 03:28, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::::@Red0ctober22, @Left guide I mentioned in my summary of changes that the hyphens were inserted into the term regular-season to correct a grammatical error.

::::Placed in front of the word championship, regular-season is being used as a compound modifier. Please see point no. 3 at MOS:HYPHEN.

::::During the 17th and 18th centuries, we might have seen, "The Giants will play the final game of the regular-season on Saturday," or "The ships is scheduled to arrive in New-York on Tuesday." This is no longer acceptable for compound nouns not acting as modifiers. However, I disagree that regular-season is almost never hyphenated. Taxman1913 (talk) 07:21, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::You have a point. Used as a standalone noun (which is what I'm more accustomed to seeing) "regular season" is typically unhyphenated. But here it's more like an adjective; I searched the particular phrase in question on Google, and it does get significant hyphenated usage in reliable sources. I'll self-revert to the status quo. Left guide (talk) 08:04, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::I still disagree with the hyphen given how you almost never see it across any sports pages. I know we follow our own manual of style on Wikipedia, but a major source like the Cambridge Dictionary [https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/regular-season here] does not use a hyphen. If we are going to use a hyphen, that breaks from the standard from hundreds of other pages. Red0ctober22 (talk) 14:15, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::::@Red0ctober22 I completely agree with you and the Cambridge Dictionary that the standard spelling of regular season is unhyphenated when it appears as a compound noun. The link you provided indicates the part of speech as n. However, in the phrase "regular-season championship", it is not a noun; it is being used as a compound modifier.

:::::::The reason compound modifiers are hyphenated is clarity. If we leave it unhyphenated, are we saying that this is a season championship that happens to be regular as opposed to a special season championship? The reader truly doesn't know, unless the term is already familiar.

:::::::From time to time, I copyedit pages here. If I see unhyphenated compound modifiers here, I fix them. I don't do it often enough to be able to say I've noticed a pattern with regular-season championship, regular-season title, etc. one way or the other. Even if it is presented incorrectly on hundreds of other pages, we should fix those rather than create another error. Taxman1913 (talk) 14:54, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::::::::Thanks for that clarification, I wasn't realizing the difference of using it as an adjective and a noun Red0ctober22 (talk) 16:30, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:::The NAIA tournament was of much higher quality until the mid-1950s, when the NCAA launched its College Division (now Division II) tournament. For many programs, getting a bid in the tournament during the pre-division era was unrealistic. The NAIA tournament filled that void, providing posteason opportunities for such teams.

:::Since few or no teams that have participated in recent NAIA tournaments are notable, the majority of NAIA results seen in team articles come from the distant past, when the tournament was far more important than it is now. For many current Division I teams, their NAIA eras represent an important part of their history. I think it is worthy of remaining in the template. Taxman1913 (talk) 07:08, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::@Left guide Both the AIAW and NCAA women's tournament were held in 1982. The NCAA pretty much ignored women until the AIAW tournament got a national TV contract. Once the NCAA started holding championships for women, it became more efficient for athletic deparments to just run their women's sports through the NCAA rather than a separate organization. The two champions in 1982 were Rutgers in the AIAW and Louisiana Tech in the NCAA. Taxman1913 (talk) 05:52, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:The coding to create collapsed boxes for the AIAW and NAIA tournaments has been completed. Several examples of the effects can be seen in the testcases. In order to test the coding and parameters were working properly, I had to enter NAIA data for some teams that you won't see on their live pages. The key takeaway is that AIAW and NAIA information is present on only a small percentage of team pages. The infobox will now be rendered on page load without these things dominating the screen.

:I'll give people a while to review and comment before moving this from the sandbox to the live template. Taxman1913 (talk) 08:25, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:Additional changes have been made in the sandbox to move mythical national championships below all NCAA tournament results in the infobox, inspired by Red0ctober22's comment. Several testcases for teams that claim these championships have been added. Overall, I believe this is an improved presentation. In the case of Chicago, we end up with Division III tournament results displayed ahead of the mythical national championship, because they have never been to the Division I tournament. The only way to fix this would be to create separate parameters for the Division II and III tournaments, which I do not suggest. Instances where this modification does not result in a better presentation will be rare.

:If you have comments about the changes, please make them known. I'll implement this change along with the collapsing of AIAW and NAIA results unless I hear otherwise. Taxman1913 (talk) 16:32, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::Seeing the new navbox, I most like the "Other XYZ tournament results" top-level header followed by the big table of now-simplified labeled sections ("Final Four") and years.

::I'd like to see all of the tournament results is a single table like that, including the best finish.

::The hiding/collapsing could then happen within that table. Show the single per-tournament header, and within that the 'best result' section by default, with ability to collapse the sections below it. But when expanded, all of the tournament results are within the same table rather than having two top-level headers for a single tournament type.

::So single header {{tpq|"NCAA tournament"}} rather than two headers {{tpq|"NCAA tournament champions"}} and {{tpq|"Other NCAA tournament results"}}. I hope that makes sense. Was that design considered before? PK-WIKI (talk) 18:41, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:::@PK-WIKI There was a consensus that the best result of the NCAA tournament should appear uncollapsed on initial page load with everything else collapsed. What you described would have been much easier to code, particularly with respect to the colors of the headers.

:::Getting the infobox to display as you describe would mean starting over; it would be a lot of work. Fortunately, the bestfinish parameter has already been introduced and now exists on a large number of pages. It could be repurposed to achieve this.

:::If there is consensus for this, I suggest getting the bestfinish parameter on all the pages it is needed before reworking the coding. That way, we'll be able to see the differences in any test case we want. Taxman1913 (talk) 19:01, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::That single header + table design could then be slightly modified for a single "Conference championship" header with tournament + regular-season + division sections rather than the multiple top-level headers we have now. And a single "National championships" (phrasing tbd) header that contains Helms, PP, etc. PK-WIKI (talk) 18:46, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

:::@PK-WIKI With that design you suggested, it will be possible to have the best result on the top line followed by a collapsed list for NCAA, AIAW and NAIA tournaments. However, if there were a single conference championships header, the entire thing would need to load collapsed. For many years, several conferences did not have tournaments. So, Indiana's regular-season conference championships might be considered more relevant than its tournament titles. In contrast, the Big East had a conference tournament from its inception, and the regular-season titles earned by its teams are not as notable as winning the conference tournament.

:::Collapsing the conference championship headers makes them two rows long, because of their length and the show/hide button. So, if there is only one row of data, it saves zero space to collapse them. Left guide and I have been going through each team. I've only been collapsing the conference championship sections, if there are at least four rows of text in the data. So, putting all this together would result in some pages having a collapsed section that is the same size as it would were it not collapsed. Since the description of the types of conference championships won would become a label, it will leave less room for data. So, as it is now, a team with five championships will take up only one row. But with less space allocated to the data, that team's five titles will likely spill over onto the next row.

:::I'm not sure we would see much benefit to doing this for the conference titles. Taxman1913 (talk) 19:16, 10 May 2025 (UTC)

::::Having a single header for all Conference achievements is desirable from a information display perspective IMO, even if it makes things slightly longer. You could also do something like a full-width interior section header with the years below it rather than the section-on-the-left design currently used in the NCAA results. PK-WIKI (talk) 19:27, 10 May 2025 (UTC)