Inside March Madness: How Wichita prepares to impress again with NCAA Tournament
There are 252 pages in the NCAA manual sent to host cities on the requirements to pull off a March Madness event.
Wichita tournament director Brad Pittman, who oversees facilities at Wichita State, is tasked with knowing all 252 pages, front to back, and following every detail, no matter how small, ahead of Thursday’s NCAA Tournament games at Intrust Bank Arena.
It’s a stress-inducing job, but also one that Pittman, Visit Wichita and Intrust Bank Arena have done well enough to land four NCAA basketball bids since 2018.
“The biggest challenge is just trying not to overthink it,” Pittman said. “I’ve spent a lot of the last several weeks, ‘OK, what am I missing?’ There’s got to be something I’m forgetting. But really, it’s all about keeping that flow going. Something is going to go wrong at some point. No one is perfect and it’s how you react to that and deal with it.”
Since Wichita last hosted the men’s basketball postseason in 2018, Intrust Bank Arena has made several improvements that fans might notice on Thursday.
The overhead scoreboard, which is completely digital, is brand new and includes four “underbelly” screens for players on the court and fans sitting courtside to see. The LED ribbon boards that line the arena are also brand new, as well as the scorer’s table, Wi-Fi system and sound system.
“When Sedgwick County built Intrust Bank Arena, the ultimate event goal for this facility, the reason why we got over 15,000 seats, was to host the NCAA men’s tournament,” said A.J. Boleski, who oversees Intrust Bank Arena as the general manager for ASM Global.
“So anytime we can do that is an amazing achievement and we want to keep doing it.”
Pittman and Boleski handle the work behind the scenes to ensure the operation runs smoothly, but the community of basketball fans is what has made Wichita stand out in the bidding process for NCAA events.
The 2018 debut of March Madness at Intrust Bank Arena was a massive success, aided by Kansas playing in the event, but Wichita also supported the 2022 NCAA women’s tournament when Sweet 16 and Elite 8 games were played downtown.
Organizers expect another lively atmosphere downtown, beginning on Wednesday with open practices that are free to the public from 11 a.m. to past 4 p.m. The official fan fest is scheduled at Naftzger Park on Thursday, but many more parties around the downtown arena are slated for when the games begin.
“There are going to be nonstop parties, nonstop action and just tons of fun,” said Josh Howell, vice president of sports development at Visit Wichita. “Even if you don’t have a ticket to the games, you can still come downtown and feel the atmosphere and have a lot of fun at the fan fest. We encourage everyone to come down because it’s free to the public.”
In preparation for hosting this week’s games, Pittman and Boleski, among others, traveled to other NCAA basketball host sites to review how other cities handle the event and see if there were any tips or tricks they could take back with them to Wichita.
What they noticed was few other cities have fan engagement outside of the arena like Wichita.
“There’s way more to hosting this event than just what happens inside the four walls of the arena,” Boleski said. “This is a community event and this community supports the NCAA Tournament very well.
“One thing you don’t see (at other sites) is all of that stuff that happens outside of the arena. It happens in some, but not all. It feels like we do a really good job of it here.
It will be difficult to replicate that same kind of atmosphere in 2018 without KU fans in attendance, but tournament organizers felt like the 8-team draw in Wichita was about as good as it could have been without the Jayhawks.
No. 1 seed Houston kicks off Thursday’s schedule at Intrust Bank Arena with a 1 p.m. game against No. 16 seed SIU Edwardsville, making its first NCAA Division I Tournament appearance, followed by No. 8 seed Gonzaga against No. 9 Georgia. The second session features No. 6 seed Missouri against No. 11 seed Drake, followed by No. 3 seed Texas Tech against No. 14 seed UNC Wilmington.
“It was a great draw for us,” Pittman said. “You have some regional teams in Missouri and Drake, you’ve got a lot of local flavor with Texas Tech, you’ve got a national power in Houston and a traditional power in Gonzaga. I think there’s a great mix of storylines for basketball fans to follow and also just a lot of really good basketball coming to town.”
Pittman, Boleski and Howell said their organizations will take care of the behind-the-scenes work that puts Wichita in a favorable light to teams and officials.
And if Wichita fans hold up their end of the bargain this week, the hope is for March Madness to return to Wichita in the very near future.
“There are only eight cities in the entire country that get the opportunity to host this event,” Boleski said. “So that’s pretty amazing in itself. Any opportunity we get to host NCAA basketball games, we’re looking forward to it.”
This story was originally published March 18, 2025 at 2:49 PM.
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