Entrepreneurs will battle each other with pitch ideas Friday between game days of the NCAA Tournament in Wichita.

Startups will participate in "Gamechangers and Champions 2025," a bracket-style pitch competition organized by Wichita-based NXTUS and the Kansas Department of Commerce at the Commerce Club in downtown Wichita.

Sixteen of the 72 startups that applied were expected to be announced by NXTUS and the Department of Commerce on social media Monday afternoon. Nine of the 72 still in contention are from Wichita. NXTUS and Commerce will narrow it to eight by Friday.

At the Friday event, eight startups will pitch their businesses, out of which four will be selected to compete for $20,000 in prize money from Wichita State University 's Barton School of Business.

"Most Kansans have no idea the breadth and quality of entrepreneurs who are building tomorrow’s great businesses right here in Kansas,” Mary Beth Jarvis, president and CEO of NXTUS, said in a news release. “Gamechangers and Champions 2025 will help change that."

Jarvis said the event will include startup founders from across the state and investors who are interested in helping companies break through in their industries.

Conor Adler, manager of NXTUS Capital Programs and the Accelerate Venture Partners angel investment group, told the WBJ the event came from conversations with angel investors across the country, and local and state organizations including the Department of Commerce.

"They had seen growth efforts realized through not only angel festivals but through pitch competitions, where there's actual capital ready to be deployed at the end of the competition," he said. "We started to put together the framework of what this could look like and obviously with March Madness in Wichita, it made a lot of sense to build off of that energy. We brought it to the Department of Commerce in January ... they jumped at the opportunity."

In addition to the pitch competition, the event will feature networking opportunities and educational sessions catered to startup founders and investors. It will include a fireside chat with Graham Krizek, CEO of bitcoin infrastructure solutions company Voltage Cloud ; an educational session by former Wichita State University and NBA basketball player Ron Baker on angel investing; and a keynote by Kevin Lockett, former Kansas State University and Kansas City Chiefs football player , who manages venture capital firm Fulcrum Global Capital.

The event is being supported by companies and organizations including WSU, Koch, the Wichita Regional Chamber of Commerce, the Greater Wichita Partnership's Opportunity Wichita affiliate, Lange Capital, and Hutton.

Tickets are $20 for people to view startup events and $150 for viewing investing events. Wichitans can watch networking sessions for free. Registration for startups and investors will be capped at 200 entries.