March Madness is a basketball tournament that decides the national college basketball champion. The past March Madness was cancelled due to COVID-19 concerns however this year the tournament will still happen. 

To ensure safety in everyone participating in the event, the NCAA will be administering COVID-19 testing to players, coaching staff, administrators, and officials and their medical protocols have been approved by Marion County Health. This year it will be hosted by Ball State, Butler, the Horizon League, Indiana, and Indiana University Purdue. Indiana University-Purdue will be providing facilities and staff to help with the tournament. While the convention center will be where the teams practice and there is a Marriott where the players will be staying. The tournament also wants to encourage people to practice safe social distancing, to do that it is promoting Mask Madness and donating thousands of masks. They will also be closely monitoring the pandemic to determine whether or not to allow fans to watch in person and if so how many.

The NCAA states that the tournament starts in March, the selection day is Sunday, March 14th and the final round occurs on April 3rd-5th. CBS reports that the first and second match is set to happen on March 19th-22nd and the Sweet 16 round occurs on March 27-28. While the Elite Eight match occurs on March 29th and 30th. This year, 55 out of 64 of the matches will be in Indiana. The Mackey Arena, Simon Skjokt Assembly Hall, Bankers Life Fieldhouse, Hinkle Fieldhouse, Indiana Farmers Coliseum, and Lucas Oil Stadium will be the main places for matches to be held. Dan Gavitt, senior Vice President of the NCAA said, “The 2021 version of March Madness will be one to remember, if for no other reason than the uniqueness of the event.”