Amid criticism, the Big 12 Conference has updated look of tournament court
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Fans and media criticized the Big 12’s LED court for poor visibility and design.
- Conference debuted team-logo court for Friday quarterfinal games.
- Criticism prompted rapid redesign, shifting presentation strategy during tournament.
When the Big 12 Conference invited reporters to the T-Mobile Center earlier this week, the league showed off a bunch of fun looks for its new LED video floor.
Then the first games began in the women’s tournament, and observers had the same reaction: meh.
The cluster of XII design returned, only with a difficult-to-see center line.
Barstool called it “a video game nightmare.” Awful Announcing declared, “Everyone hates the Big 12 Tournament basketball court, again.” USA Today said “The Big 12 is misusing its awesome new glass floor.”
“You can debate whether it really is a great idea to use the floor or not, but if you are going to use it, you may as well use it in some cool way,” a fan wrote on Reddit. “What is the point if you are just going to have them all play on the same ugly court design instead of making the court half and half, or having the full court be the ‘home team’ court design, or anything else.”
The Reddit CFB X account wrote: “The Big 12 has a digital court for their conference basketball tournaments, and could have made it look like whatever they wanted. They chose the ugliest most distracting court imaginable.”
You get the point, right? No one liked the court through the first two days of the women’s tournament.
The Big 12 apparently heard the complaints, because it debuted a new floor for Friday’s quarterfinal games. This one included logos of the teams playing and did away with the XII overkill design. Take a look.
‘Bullying works’
The change didn’t go unnoticed and fans were happy their critical comments were heard by the Big 12 Conference.
This story was originally published March 6, 2026 at 11:58 AM.
