East Coast viewers won’t have to stay up as late to watch the men’s college basketball national championship game this year.
The NCAA announced Tuesday that the March Madness game’s tip-off time had been moved up to 8:50 p.m. ET from its traditional start time of 9:20 p.m. It’s a welcome move for many after the game has long taken more than two hours to complete and pushed up against midnight in the Eastern time zone.
🚨 National Championship tip-off time!
The 2025 National Championship will tip off at 8:50pm ET – 30 minutes earlier than the typical start time. pic.twitter.com/h39KTt16Q0
— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessMBB) January 28, 2025
The change in tip times also comes as ratings for the Final Four have dropped in recent seasons. In 2017, the title game between North Carolina and Gonzaga drew nearly 23 million viewers on CBS. In 2023, UConn’s win over San Diego State averaged 14.7 million viewers on CBS.
A year ago, Turner’s cable networks drew just over 14.8 million for UConn’s win over Purdue. The games were televised simultaneously on TBS, TNT and TruTV. Since the cancellation of the 2020 NCAA tournaments due to COVID-19, the most-watched men’s game has been the 2022 semifinal between North Carolina and Duke. That was the final game in the storied career of Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski.
The move up also follows what the College Football Playoff did in 2022. After the playoff’s national championship games had traditionally started after 8 p.m. ET, the CFP moved up the title game to a 7:30 p.m ET kickoff three seasons ago.
