2026 NCAA Division III men's basketball tournament

The 2026 NCAA Division III men's basketball tournament will be a single-elimination tournament to determine the national champion of men's NCAA Division III college basketball in the United States, the culmination of the 2025–26 NCAA Division III men's basketball season.

The tournament will again feature sixty-four teams, with teams placed into one of four sixteen-team regionals. The first three rounds will be played on campus sites, followed by the quarterfinal and semifinal rounds at the Allen County War Memorial Coliseum in Fort Wayne, Indiana from March 19–21, 2026. The national championship game will be played at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, Indiana on April 5, 2026, as part of a joint championship weekend alongside the Division II and NIT championships, the first such arrangement since 2020.^[1]

First and second rounds

First- and second-round games were played at campus sites on March 6 and March 7.

On the basis of team strength and geography, these locations were chosen to host first- and second-round games in the 2026 tournament:

• Ray Oosting Gymnasium, Hartford, Connecticut (Host: Trinity College)
• Woodsboro Bank Arena, Frederick, Maryland (Host: Hood College)
• Silloway Gymnasium, Middletown, Connecticut (Host: Wesleyan University)
• Cousens Gymnasium, Medford, Massachusetts (Host: Tufts University)
• Ron Rosner Arena, Fredericksburg, Virginia (Host: University of Mary Washington)
• Mitchell Hall, La Crosse, Wisconsin (Host: University of Wisconsin–La Crosse)
• Ratner Athletics Center, Chicago, Illinois (Host: University of Chicago)
• Gus Young Court, St. Peter, Minnesota (Host: Gustavus Adolphus College)
• Woodruff Physical Education Center, Atlanta, Georgia (Host: Emory University)
• Panzer Athletic Center, Montclair, New Jersey (Host: Montclair State University)
• MacDonald Gymnasium, Beverly, Massachusetts (Host: Endicott College)
• Shirk Center, Bloomington, Illinois (Host: Illinois Wesleyan University)
• Jerabeck Activity and Athletic Center, Houston, Texas (Host: University of St. Thomas)
• Washington University Field House, St. Louis, Missouri^[a] (Host: Washington University in St. Louis)
• Crenshaw Gymnasium, Ashland, Virginia (Host: Randolph–Macon College)
• Freeman Center, Newport News, Virginia (Host: Christopher Newport University)

A total of sixty-four bids will be available for the tournament: 43 automatic bids—awarded to the champions of the forty-three NCAA-recognized Division III conference tournaments—and 21 at-large bids.

The following 43 teams were automatic qualifiers for the 2026 NCAA field by virtue of winning their conference's automatic bid (except for the UAA, whose regular-season champion received the automatic bid).^[2]

The following 21 teams were awarded qualification for the tournament field by the NCAA's NPI rankings, a computer ranking system that evaluates teams' winning percentage, strength of schedule, home-away bonus, quality wins, and overtime results.^[3]

• 2026 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament
• 2026 NCAA Division II men's basketball tournament
• 2026 NAIA men's basketball tournament
• 2026 NCAA Division III women's basketball tournament