But they are only doing it for men's basketball. Women's basketball apparently still does not have a regular season champ (other than division champs UALR and Middle Tennessee).
It wasn't necessary for the men last year because the seeding was done 1-13 for the postseason tournament. This year, the seeding was done by divisions and there are two No. 1 seeds (FAU and Arkansas State). The NIT then gives an automatic bid to the conference regular season champ if they don't make the NCAA. If they do make it, the NIT doesn't have to take a team from that conference.
The WNIT gives an automatic bid to the top team in the league that doesn't make the NCAA. Last year when UALR and Middle Tennessee made the NCAA Tournament, Western Kentucky got the automatic bid as the next-best team. If they had done it the same way as the men this year, UALR would have won it due to a head-to-head victory over Middle Tennessee.
The rules for the men changed over the weekend. Last week, the Sun Belt wasn't awarding a regular-season men's basketball championship. This week, they are. So, congrats to the FAU men on a regular-season conference championship.
