The NCAA tournament is coming to West Lafayette.

The NCAA announced this morning that it will stage the 2021 men’s basketball championship in Indiana, with the majority of the event’s 67 games taking place in Indianapolis. One of the non-Indianapolis venues will be Purdue's Mackey Arena.

Mackey has played host to NCAA men's tournament games just one other time: 1980, when the Boilermakers beat LaSalle and St. John's en route to a Final Four run to Indianapolis fueled by Joe Barry Carroll.

Purdue will be one of six hosts along with Ball State, Butler, the Horizon League, Indiana and IUPUI which are lending their facilities and staffs to assist with tournament operations, according to a NCAA release. The Indiana Convention Center will be used as a practice facility, with multiple courts set up inside the venue.

Games will be played on two courts inside Lucas Oil Stadium, as well as Bankers Life Fieldhouse, Hinkle Fieldhouse, Indiana Farmers Coliseum, Mackey Arena and Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall. Only one game at a time will be played at Lucas Oil Stadium.

Selection Sunday is March 14, with the Final Four slated for April 3 and 5. Preliminary-round dates have yet to be determined.

Speculation had swirled that Mackey was under consideration to be a host for 2021 NCAA games. Purdue A.D. Mike Bobinski addressed it last month.

“We at Purdue have had conversations with the NCAA Men's Basketball staff,” said Bobinski. “They’ve already made one visit up here to look at us as a potential participant in helping those early rounds come off. They’ll need multiple sites to do that right. We are more than happy and willing to do everything we can to be a good partner, and to be able to host potentially as many as four games over two days, two in two I think might be the plan. We’re hopeful that gets done, because we want to be part of the solution.”

Now, it has been done. Let the NCAA games begin in Mackey.

Membership Info: Sign up for GoldandBlack.com now | Why join? | Questions?

Follow GoldandBlack.com: Twitter | Facebook | YouTube

More: Gold and Black Illustrated/Gold and Black Express | Subscribe to our podcast

Copyright, Boilers, Inc. 2021. All Rights Reserved. Reproducing or using editorial or graphical content, in whole or in part, without permission, is strictly prohibited.