As my Pittsburgh friend told me last week, “The bracket needs… As my Pittsburgh friend told me last week, “The bracket needs tweaked.”

Rumors have swirled recently about the NCAA Tournament expanding to 96 teams. Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany said last week that expansion for the 2011 Tournament is “probable,” and The Pitt News’ Randy Lieberman recently wrote on the pros and cons of such a change.

But I’m not here to talk about something as drastic as expansion. I’m here to talk about reseeding.

In a playoff structure that reseeds after each round, the advancing teams are sorted by their rank, and the highest seed plays the lowest remaining seed, the second seed plays the penultimate seed, and so on.

The NHL, MLB and NFL all reseed after each playoff round. The NBA, meanwhile, does not, and its system — in which division winners are de facto guaranteed no higher than a No. 5 seed, among other wacky features — has been criticized since it was instituted in 2006.

Of course, the NCAA Tournament does not reseed. After all, that’s why bracket pools are possible.

The Tournament bracket nonetheless is set up to function like reseeding if there are no upsets. A No. 1 seed would play the No. 8, then the No. 4 and then the No. 2.

Upsets, though, ruin everything.

Check out Michigan State’s run to the Final Four. The No. 5 Spartans played No. 4 seed Maryland in the second round, but then played No. 9 seed Northern Iowa in the Sweet 16 because of the Panthers’ upset of Kansas. Tennessee’s win over No. 2 Kansas State then set up an Elite Eight battle between a No. 5 and a No. 6.

Had the Tournament reseeded, the Spartans and the Volunteers would still have played — but in the second round.

Though everyone loves a good upset, Michigan State-Tennessee doesn’t sound like a marquee matchup for a trip to Indianapolis. In fact, New York Daily News columnist Dick Weiss wrote, “Thank heaven the Duke Blue Devils are in the Final Four,” because without them the Tournament’s conclusion would be a television ratings disaster.

For proof on the need for reseeding, look no further than the Final Four itself. On one side of the bracket, two of the top five teams in the country battled. On the other side, two No. 5 seeds played.

In a reseeded Tournament, Duke would have played Butler, and West Virginia would have played Michigan State. Duke-West Virginia would have been a championship game scenario.

Reseeding helps provide the best matchups between the best teams. Across sports, it’s all about the big names. Since 2001, the five World Series that had the Yankees or Red Sox in it drew the five highest television ratings, and there’s a reason NBC schedules Pittsburgh and Washington in its hockey coverage so often.

In a reseeded world, Kansas plays No. 14 seed Ohio and Northern Iowa plays Maryland.

But thanks to the bracket, Ohio had the easiest second-round opponent of any underdog. If a team wants a Tournament bid, it might as well wish for low seed. It means an easier second-round opponent should it get by the first round.

Look at the South region of this year’s Tournament. Because of upsets all around them, Baylor made the Elite Eight without playing a single-digit seed.

And reseeding doesn’t ruin the possibility of a Cinderella — it just weeds out flukes. Take the Butler Bulldogs, a deserving Final Four surprise. The Bulldogs beat the top two seeds in the West, although thanks to the bracket’s setup they did it in backward order.

If the Tournament reseeded, every underdog would have to take this route. For perspective, in 2006, George Mason’s easiest opponent was in the Sweet 16, when the Patriots faced No. 7 seed Wichita State. That doesn’t make sense.

The obstacles to the plan are obvious. First, there’s the travel issue. The Tournament breaks down each region into four locations. No reseeded team wants to win in Milwaukee only to learn it has to bus to Buffalo to play its second-round game. The solution to this is simple, though: one host city for each region’s first two rounds. Make it a big deal.

Second, the NCAA can opt out of its current contract with CBS after this year. If that happens, ESPN will snatch up the Tournament — the one event it currently must talk about against its marketing will — and persuade the NCAA to expand to another round of revenue-generating nationally televised Tournament games, bracket intact.

Third, when asked by USA Today about reseeding, former NCAA committee chairman Mike Slive said it won’t happen.

“I’m comfortable with the way it is,” he said. “I don’t think tinkering is in the best interest [of the event].”

But they’re willing to expand.