The NCAA will expand its men's and women's March Madness tournaments by eight teams each beginning next season, increasing the brackets to 76 teams. The expanded format will add eight extra games, for a total of 12 games involving 24 teams, in the first week of each tournament.

The opening round, previously known as the First Four, will be renamed the "March Madness Opening Round." The 12 winners of the opening round will advance to the main 64-team bracket, which begins on Thursday for the men's tournament and Friday for the women's tournament. The number of at-large selections in the men's tournament will rise from 37 to 44.

This will be the first expansion of the tournaments in 15 years, since they were increased to 68 teams each. The basic six-round tournament structure began in 1985. One reason for the delay was the NCAA's negotiations with CBS and TNT over media rights and ownership issues, and an expansion to 96 teams would have required adding an extra week to the tournament.

The NCAA will distribute more than $131 million in new revenue to schools that make the tournament. The new revenue will come from expanded TV advertising opportunities for alcohol sponsors, including beer, wine, spirits and hard seltzer, with more advertising space on CBS, TNT and other partners. The first expansion of the men's tournament in 15 years will be funded by approximately $300 million in additional funding from new alcohol sponsorship opportunities. The value of the media rights agreement will increase by $50 million each year on average over the six-year term. The current media rights deal for the men's tournament is worth $8.8 billion and runs through 2032.

"A nice way to create some access but make sure we have the bracket we all love when we start Thursday at noon." said Keith Gill, chairman of the Division I men's basketball committee. Most of the eight new tournament slots are expected to go to teams from power conferences. The Southeastern Conference placed a record 14 teams in the men's tournament bracket two years ago, and the Big Ten had nine teams in the men's tournament bracket last season.

"This is strictly a money grab for the Power Four conferences to get teams that finished 6-10 in their conference to get into the tournament," said Geno Auriemma, University of Connecticut women's basketball coach.

"Things will look a little different, but feel very, very similar," said Amanda Braun, women's tournament committee chair. The expanded tournaments will feature 120 games across the men's and women's tournaments over seven days.