March Madness games broadcast on all four networks use a variation of the longtime CBS College Basketball theme (which has been used since 1993) music composed by Bob Christianson.

[6] The NCAA took advantage of an opt-out clause in its 1999 deal with CBS (which ran through 2013, even though the NCAA had the option of ending the agreement after the 2010 championship) to announce its intention to sign a new contract with CBS and Turner Sports, a division of WarnerMedia, which later was absorbed into Warner Bros.

In 2014 and 2015, Turner channels had exclusive rights to the Final Four (with standard coverage airing on TBS), and CBS broadcast the championship game.

The 2018 tournament, with TBS televising the national semifinals and final, is the first in which those particular games are subject to authentication restrictions.

In 2016, CBS extended the selection show to a two-hour format; however, the new special was criticized by viewers for being too padded, while the full bracket was leaked online shortly into the broadcast.

[17] In 2018, the selection show aired for the first time on TBS, with a studio audience and in a two-hour format, in which the entire field of the tournament would be revealed within the first 10 minutes.

However, this involved initially revealing the teams in alphabetical order, and not the bracket proper—a decision which proved unpopular among critics and viewers.

The corporate reorganization will not outwardly affect coverage of NCAA March Madness, which remains on the same networks.

All technicians and utility staff who were expected to work the tournament were still paid,[24] while CBS aired classic Final Four games on the afternoons of March 21, 22, and 29 as replacement programming.

[29][30] The Teamcast feeds returned for the 2015 tournament, now branded as Team Stream powered by Bleacher Report.

[38] TUDN broadcasts the tournament in Mexico; CBS and Turner Sports also feature Spanish play-by-play in the United States via each network's second audio program.

Former lead TNT NBA voice Marv Albert did the same with Anderson, until he ended his association with CBS.

(TNT's #1, #3, and #4 NBA voices, Kevin Harlan, Ian Eagle, and Spero Dedes, are already employed by CBS and thus do not require special arrangement to appear.)

After his retirement in April 2022 as Villanova head coach, Jay Wright joined CBS Sports as an analyst.

Greg Gumbel had led studio hosting duties until 2024, when he took that year's tournament off due to family health issues.

Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith, both from Inside, join Johnson, Zucker, and CBS analysts Clark Kellogg and Wally Szczerbiak in the studio in New York City, while Lefkoe is joined by TNT Sports colleague Candace Parker, CBS analysts Seth Davis, and legendary Villanova head coach Jay Wright in Atlanta.

This tournament version of the scoreboard is anchored to the edges of the screen with shadows, which light up in team colors after a made basket, an effect not seen on CBS's graphics anywhere else.

The tournament version of this scoreboard uses a similar layout of CBS's regular season graphics, with the CBS, TBS, TNT and truTV logos on the left side of the score bar, and an extra bar being added to the end displaying what round and which region each game is in (e.g. NCAA West 1st Round).

Discovery's coverage of March Madness always concludes with "One Shining Moment", the current version performed by Luther Vandross.

During select intros and into commercial breaks in the 2016 coverage, all broadcasters used "Turn Up" by The Heavy as the bumper music.

After three years of using alternative/rock artists, CBS and Turner were scheduled to use "Dance Again", by American pop singer Selena Gomez.

In 2024, TUDN used "La vida Solo es Una" by María Isabel as a Spanish Theme song.