The road to the DII Men’s Elite Eight is a five-month journey that culminates with the DII men’s basketball championship tournament. Sixty-four teams begin the battle every March, but only one comes out the victor.

Let’s take a look at how the DII men’s basketball tournament works.

When did the DII men’s basketball tournament begin?

You can date the tournament back to 1957 when it was the NCAA College Division Basketball Championship. Wheaton (Ill) finished off its 28-1 season by defeating Kentucky Wesleyan 89-65 in Evansville, Indiana for the first national championship. It would remain that way — and in Evansville — until 1974, when Morgan State defeated Missouri State 67-52 in what is considered the first official Division II basketball championship. By 1982, NCAA DII was rolling with both men's and women's sports, and with the DII women’s basketball tournament joining into the mix, the tournament was coined the DII men’s basketball championship.

How do teams get into the DII men’s basketball tournament?

So, where do the other 41 teams come from? You could say the process begins three weeks before the season ends. This is when the NCAA releases its first regional rankings. Those rankings, released every Wednesday over the final three weeks of the season, give us an idea of the top eight teams in each region.

Once the conference tournaments are complete and the 23 automatic bids are resolved, the DII men’s basketball selection committee goes to work. What are the criteria they are looking for?

It starts with the won-lost record in Division II which needs to be .500 or better while having competed against at least 22 DII men's basketball programs. If the program qualifies, next the committee looks at the following.

Once the committee comes to its consensus 41 at-large teams, the bracket is announced in a Selection Show on NCAA.com the Sunday before the tournament begins.

What does the DII men’s basketball championship bracket look like?

The championship bracket is set up like the traditional 64-team bracket we have become accustomed to thanks to March Madness. Two regions are placed in four separate quadrants. Play begins in eight single-elimination regional tournaments. The eight regional champions emerge as the DII Men’s Elite Eight and head to a final site for the remainder of the three rounds of play.

Beginning with the 2016 DII Men’s Elite Eight field, the remaining teams were seeded Nos. 1 through 8. The 2019 season was the first time that lower seeds advanced to semifinals play, as three of the four lower seeds accomplished the feat.

Important dates for the 2023-24 DII men’s basketball tournament

Now that the season is over, the only date to remember is March 30, 2024, when Minnesota State hoisted it's first national championship. Check back later for updated dates for the coming 2024-25 season.

DII men's basketball history

Wheaton was able to defeat Kentucky Wesleyan for that first national championship in 1957. Kentucky Wesleyan apparently took that personally. Since that loss, it has become the all-time winningest championship team in DII men’s basketball history with eight titles to its name.

Minnesota State made program history in 2024, preventing Nova Southeastern from becoming the second repeat champion in the past five years. Those same Sharks ran the table in 2023, joining the 2019 Northwest Missouri State team, Evansville (1965), Cal State Bakersfield (1993), Fort Hays State (1996), and Findlay (2009) in the exclusive club of undefeated champions. .

You can take a look at the programs with the most DII men’s basketball championships here and see the complete championship game history below.