Current season or competition: 2011 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament |
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Sport | College basketball |
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Founded | 1939 |
No. of teams | 68 (since 2011) |
Country(ies) | United States |
Most recent champion(s) | Connecticut Huskies (3) |
Most titles | UCLA Bruins (11) |
TV partner(s) | CBS, TBS, TNT, truTV |
Official website | NCAA.com |
The NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship is a single-elimination tournament held each spring in the United States, featuring 68 college basketball teams, to determine the national championship in the top tier of college basketball. The tournament, organized by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), was created in 1939 by the National Association of Basketball Coaches, and was the brainchild of Ohio State university coach Harold Olsen.[1] Held mostly in March, it is known informally as March Madness or the Big Dance, and has become one of the most prominent annual sporting events in the United States.
The tournament teams include champions from 31 Division I conferences (which receive automatic bids), and 37 teams which are awarded at-large berths. These "at-large" teams are chosen by an NCAA selection committee, as detailed below. The 68 teams are divided into four regions and organized into a single elimination "bracket", which predetermines, when a team wins a game, which team it will face next. Each team is "seeded", or ranked, within its region. After an initial four games between eight lower-seeded teams, the tournament takes place over the course of three weekends, at pre-selected neutral sites around the United States. Lower-seeded teams are placed in the bracket against higher seeded teams. Each weekend cuts three-fourths of the teams, from a Round of 64, to a "Sweet Sixteen", to a "Final Four"; the Final Four usually play on the first weekend in April. These four teams, one from each region, battle it out in one destination for the national championship.
The tournament has been at least partially televised since 1969, and today, with games covered by CBS, TBS, TNT, and truTV, all games are available for viewing nationwide. As television coverage has grown, so too has the tournament's popularity and place in American culture. Today, millions of Americans "fill out a bracket",[2] predicting winners of all 67 games.
With 11 national titles, UCLA holds the record for the most NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championships; John Wooden coached UCLA to 10 of its 11 titles. The University of Kentucky is second, with 7 national titles, while Indiana University and the University of North Carolina are tied for third with 5 national titles. 2010 champion Duke University ranks fifth with 4 national titles.
The NCAA has changed the tournament format several times since its inception, most often reflecting an expansion of the field. This section describes the tournament as it has operated since 2011. For changes over the course of its history, and to see how the tournament operated in past years, go to Format history, below.
A total of 68 teams qualify for the tournament played in March and April. Thirty-one (31) teams earn automatic bids by winning their respective conference tournaments. Thirty (30) of the 31 conferences hold tournaments to determine their respective automatic qualifiers. Only the Ivy League does not conduct a post-season tournament; its automatic bid goes to the regular-season conference champion.
The remaining thirty-seven (37) tournament slots are granted to at-large bids, which are determined by the Selection Committee, a special committee appointed by the NCAA. The committee also determines where all sixty-eight teams are seeded and placed in the bracket.
The tournament is split into four regions and each region has at least sixteen teams, but four additional teams are added per the decision of the Selection Committee. (See First Four). The committee is charged with making each of the four regions as close as possible in overall quality of teams.
The names of the regions vary from year to year, and are broadly geographic (such as "Southeast", "East" or "Midwest"). The selected names roughly correspond to the location of the four cities hosting the regional finals. For example, in 2011, the regions were named East (Newark, New Jersey), West (Anaheim, California), Southwest (San Antonio, Texas), and Southeast (New Orleans). However, oftentimes the chosen names for the regions appear counterintuitive to some observers, such as in 1990, when Atlanta hosted the East regional and Richmond hosted the Southeast regional.[3]
The selection committee seeds the whole field of 68 teams from 1-68, but does not make this information public. Instead, the committee divides the teams amongst the regions. The top four teams will be distributed among the four regions, and each will receive a #1 seed within that region. The next four ranked teams will also be distributed among the four regions, each receiving a #2 seed with their region, and the process continues down the line. Carried to its logical conclusion, this would give each region seventeen teams seeded 1-17, but as seen below, this is complicated somewhat (see The First Four).
The bracket is thus set in stone, and in the semifinals, the champion of top #1 seed's region will play against the champion of the fourth No. 1 seed's region, and the champion of the second-ranked #1 seed's region will play against the champion of third-ranked #1 seed's region.[4]
The selection committee is also instructed to place teams so that whenever possible, conference teams cannot meet until the regional finals. In addition, they are also instructed to avoid any possible rematches of regular season or previous year's tournament games during the Rounds of 32 and 64.[5]
In the men's tournament, all sites are nominally neutral: teams are prohibited from playing tournament games on their home courts prior to the Final Four (though in some cases, a team may be fortunate enough to play in or near its home state or city). Under current NCAA rules, any court on which a team hosts more than three regular-season games (in other words, not including conference tournament games) is considered a "home court".[6]
However, while a team can be moved to a different region if its home court is being used in any of the first two weeks of the tournament, the Final Four venue is determined years in advance, and cannot be changed regardless of participants. For this reason, in theory a team could play in a Final Four on its home court; in reality, this would be unlikely, since the Final Four is usually staged at a venue larger than most college basketball arenas. (The most recent team to play the Final Four in its home city was Butler in 2010; its home court seats only 10,000, as opposed to the 70,000-plus of Lucas Oil Stadium in its Final Four configuration.)
The tournament has several rounds. They are currently called
The tournament is single-elimination; this format increases the chance of Cinderella advancing in the tournament. This is because, although these lower-seeded teams are forced to play stronger teams, they need only win once to advance, instead of winning a majority of games in a series, such as is done in professional basketball.
The appellation "First Four" refers to the number of games played, not the number of teams. First held in 2011, the First Four is played between the lowest four at-large qualifying teams and the lowest four automatic bid (conference champion) teams. This does not, however, mean that these are necessarily the lowest eight teams in the field. The four games are held to determine which four teams will assume a place amongst the teams participating in the Round of 64. Unlike all the other early games in the tournament, the teams are not matched with an eye toward disparity, but rather, of equality. This is because in one game two teams may be vying for a #16 seed in the Round of 64, but in another game the two teams may be vying for perhaps a #12 seed, or even higher.
While most NCAA tournament games are played over the weekend, the First Four games are played during the week, between Selection Sunday and the weekend immediately following. Once the First Four games are played, the four winning teams assume their places in the bracket of 64 teams, and must play again that weekend, with little rest.
In the Second Round (the Round of 64), the #1 seed plays the #16 seed in all regions; the #2 team plays the #15, and so on. The effect of this seeding structure ensures that the better a team is seeded, the worse-seeded (and presumably weaker) their opponents will be. Sixteen second-round games are played on the Thursday following the "First Four" round. The remaining sixteen second-round games are played Friday. At this point the field is whittled down to 32 teams.
The Third Round (the Round of 32) is played on Saturday and Sunday immediately following the second round. The third round consists of Thursday's winners playing in eight games on Saturday, followed by Friday's winners playing in the remaining eight third-round games on Sunday. Thus, after the first weekend, 16 teams remain, commonly called the "Sweet Sixteen."
The teams that are still alive after the first weekend advance to the regional semifinals (the Sweet Sixteen) and finals (the Elite Eight), which are played on the second weekend of the tournament (again, the games are split into Thursday/Saturday and Friday/Sunday). Four regional semi-final games are played Thursday and four are played Friday. After Friday's games, 8 teams (the Elite Eight) remain. Saturday features two regional final games matching Thursday's winners and Sunday's two final games match Friday's winners. After the second weekend of the tournament, the four regional champions emerge as the "Final Four."
The winners of each region advance to the Final Four, where the national semifinals are played on Saturday and the national championship is played on Monday. As noted above, which regional champion play which, and in which semifinal they play, is determined by the overall rankings of the four #1 seeds in the original bracket, not on the seeds of the eventual Final Four teams themselves.
As indicated below, none of these phrases are exclusively used in regards to the NCAA tournament. Nonetheless, they are widely associated with the tournament, sometimes for legal reasons, sometimes just because it's become part of the American sports vernacular.
March Madness is a popular term for season-ending basketball tournaments played in March. March Madness is also a registered trademark currently owned exclusively by the NCAA.
H. V. Porter, an official with the Illinois High School Association (and later a member of the Basketball Hall of Fame), was the first person to use March Madness to describe a basketball tournament. Porter published an essay named March Madness in 1939, and in 1942 used the phrase in a poem, Basketball Ides of March. Through the years the use of March Madness picked up steam, especially in Illinois, Indiana, and other parts of the Midwest. During this period the term was used almost exclusively in reference to state high school tournaments. In 1977 Jim Enright published a book about the Illinois tournament entitled March Madness.[7]
Fans began connecting the term to the NCAA tournament in the early 1980s. Evidence suggests that CBS sportscaster Brent Musburger, who had worked for many years in Chicago before joining CBS, popularized the term during the annual tournament broadcasts.
Only in the 1990s did either the IHSA or NCAA think about trademarking the term, and by that time a small television production company named Intersport had beaten them both to the punch. IHSA eventually bought the trademark rights from Intersport, and then went to court to establish its primacy. IHSA sued GTE Vantage, an NCAA licensee that used the name March Madness for a computer game based on the college tournament. In 1996, in a historic ruling, Illinois High School Association v. GTE Vantage, Inc., the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit created the concept of a "dual-use trademark," granting both the IHSA and NCAA the right to trademark the term for their own purposes.
Following the ruling, the NCAA and IHSA joined forces and created the March Madness Athletic Association to coordinate the licensing of the trademark and investigate possible trademark infringement. One such case involved a company that had obtained the internet domain name marchmadness.com and was using it to post information about the NCAA tournament. In 2003, in March Madness Athletic Association v. Netfire, Inc., the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit held that March Madness was not a generic term, and ordered Netfire to relinquish the domain name to the NCAA.[8]
Later in the 2000s, the IHSA relinquished its ownership share in the trademark, although it retained the right to use the term in connection with high school championships. In October 2010, the NCAA reached a settlement with Intersport, paying $17.2 million for the latter company's license to use the trademark.[9]
The term Final Four refers to the last four teams remaining in the playoff tournament. These are the champions of the tournament's four regional brackets, and are the only teams remaining on the tournament's final weekend. (While the term "Final Four" was not used in the early decades of the tournament, the term has been applied retroactively to include the last four teams in tournaments from earlier years, even when only two brackets existed.)
Some claim that the phrase Final Four was first used to describe the final games of Indiana's annual high school basketball tournament. But the NCAA, which has a trademark on the term, says Final Four was originated by a Plain Dealer sportswriter, Ed Chay, in a 1975 article that appeared in the Official Collegiate Basketball Guide. The article stated that Marquette University βwas one of the final fourβ in the 1974 tournament. The NCAA started capitalizing the term in 1978 and turning it into a trademark several years later.
In recent years, the term Final Four has spread into other sports besides basketball. Tournaments which use Final Four include the Euroleague in basketball, national basketball competitions in several European countries and the now-defunct European Hockey League. Together with the name Final Four, these tournaments have adopted an NCAA-style format in which the four surviving teams compete in a single-elimination tournament held in one place, typically, during one weekend. The derivative term "Frozen Four" is used by the NCAA to refer to the final rounds of the Division I men's and women's ice hockey tournaments. Until 1999, it was just a popular nickname for the last two rounds of the hockey tournament; officially, it was also called the Final Four.
Although there is no official definition of what constitutes a Cinderella team, there does seem to be a consensus that such teams represent small schools, are seeded rather low in the tournament, and achieve at least one unexpected win in the tournament. The term became popularized as a result of CCNY's run through the tournament in 1950.[10]
For decades, fans have been entering into office pools or private gambling-related contests as to who can predict the tournament most correctly; President Barack Obama has referred to the filling out of a tournament bracket as a "national pastime".[11] Filling out a tournament bracket with predictions is called the practice of bracketology, and sports programming during the tournament is rife with commentators comparing the accuracy of their predictions. On the Dan Patrick radio show, a wide variety of celebrities from various fields (such as Darius Rucker, Charlie Sheen, and Brooklyn Decker) have posted full brackets with predictions. President Obama's bracket is posted on the White House website.
There are many different tournament prediction scoring systems. Most award points for correctly picking the winning team in a particular match up, with increasingly more points being given for correctly predicting later round winners. Some provide bonus points for correctly predicting upsets, the amount of the bonus varying based on the degree of upset.
There are 2^63 or 9,223,372,036,854,775,808 (9.2 quintillion) possibilities for the possible winners in a 64 team NCAA bracket, making the odds of randomly picking a perfect bracket (i.e. without weighting for seed number) 9.2 quintillion to 1.[12] With the expansion of the tournament field to 68 teams in 2011, the odds are now increased to 2^67 or 147,573,952,589,676,412,928 (147.57 quintillion) possibilities.
The NCAA tournament has changed its format many times over the years. Below are listed many of these changes.
For a list of all the cities and stadiums that have hosted the Final Four, go to Host cities, below.
Since 1997, the NCAA has required that all Final Four sessions take place in domed stadiums with a minimum capacity of 40,000, usually having only a half of the dome in use. The last small arena to host the Final Four was The Meadowlands in 1996. As of 2009, the minimum was raised to 70,000, by adding additional seating on the floor of the dome, and raising the court on a platform three feet above the dome's floor, which is usually crowned for football, like the setup at Minnesota's Metrodome.
The first instance of a domed stadium being used for a NCAA Tournament Final Four was the Houston Astrodome in 1971, but the Final Four would not return to a dome until 1982, when the Mercedes-Benz Superdome in New Orleans hosted the event for the first time.
Since the inception of the modern Final Four in 1952, only once has a team played a Final Four on its actual home court. But through the 2011 tournament, three other teams have played the Final Four in their home cities, one other team has played in its metropolitan area, and six additional teams have played the Final Four in their home states through the 2010 tournament. Kentucky (1958), UCLA (1968, 1972, 1975) and North Carolina State (1974) won the national title; Louisville (1959) and Purdue (1980) lost in the Final Four; and California (1960), Duke (1994), Michigan State (2009) and Butler (2010) lost in the final.
The biggest advantage was in 1959 when Louisville played at its regular home of Freedom Hall; however, they lost to West Virginia in the semifinals. The following year, Cal had nearly as large an edge, as they only had to cross San Francisco Bay to play in the Final Four at the Cow Palace in Daly City; the Golden Bears lost in the championship game to Ohio State. UCLA had a similar advantage in 1968 and 1972 when it advanced to the Final Four at the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena, not many miles from the Bruins' homecourt of Pauley Pavilion (and also UCLA's home arena before the latter venue opened in 1965); unlike Louisville and Cal, the Bruins won the national title on both occasions. Butler lost the 2010 title 6 miles (9.7 km) from its Indianapolis campus.
Before the Final Four was established, the East and West regionals were held at separate sites, with the winners advancing to the title game. During that era, three teams, all from Manhattan, played in the East Regional at Madison Square Gardenβfrequently used as a "big-game" venue by each teamβand advanced at least to the national semifinals. NYU won the East Regional in 1945 but lost in the title game, also held at the Garden, to Oklahoma A&M. CCNY played in the East Regional in both 1947 and 1950; the Beavers lost in the 1947 East final to eventual champion Holy Cross but won the 1950 East Regional and national titles at the Garden.
In 1974, North Carolina State won the NCAA tournament without leaving their home state, North Carolina. The team was put in the East Region, and played its regional games at home arena Reynolds Coliseum. NC State played the final four and national championship games at nearby Greensboro Coliseum.
While not their home state, Kansas has played in the championship game in Kansas City, Missouri, only 45 minutes from their campus in Lawrence, Kansas, not just once, but four times. In 1940, 1953, and 1957 they lost the championship game each time at Municipal Auditorium. In 1988, playing at Kansas City's Kemper Arena, Kansas won the championship, over Big Eight rival Oklahoma.
The NCAA has banned the Bi-Lo Center and Colonial Life Arena in South Carolina from hosting tournament games, despite their sizes (16,000 and 18,000 seats, respectively) because of an NAACP protest at the Bi-Lo Center during the 2002 first and second round tournament games over that state's refusal to take down the Confederate Battle Flag from their state capitol. Following requests by the NAACP and Black Coaches Association, the Bi-Lo Center, and the newly built Colonial Center, which was built for purposes of hosting the tournament, were banned from hosting any future tournament events.[14]
As a tournament ritual, the winning team cuts down the nets at the end of regional championship games as well as the national championship game. Starting with the seniors, and moving down by classes, players each cut a single strand off of each net; the head coach cuts the last strand connecting the net to the hoop, claiming the net itself.[15] This tradition is credited to Everett Case, the coach of North Carolina State, who stood on his players' shoulders to accomplish the feat after the Wolfpack won the Southern Conference tournament in 1947.[16]
The NCAA awards the National Champions a gold plated Wooden NCAA National Championship trophy. The loser of the championship game receives a silver plated National Runner-Up trophy for second place. All four Final Four teams receive a bronze plated NCAA Regional Championship trophy.
The champions also receive a commemorative gold championship ring, and the other three Final Four teams receive Final Four rings.
The National Association of Basketball Coaches also presents a more elaborate marble/crystal trophy to the winning team. Ostensibly, this award is given for taking the top position in the NABC's end-of-season poll, but this is invariably the same as the NCAA championship game winner. In 2005, Siemens AG acquired naming rights to the NABC trophy, which is now called the Siemens Trophy. Formerly, the NABC trophy was presented right after the standard NCAA championship trophy, but this caused some confusion.[17] Since 2006, the Siemens/NABC Trophy has been presented separately at a press conference the day after the game.[18]
After the championship trophy is awarded, one player is selected and then awarded the Most Outstanding Player award (which almost always come from the championship team). It is not intended to be the same as a Most Valuable Player award although it is sometimes informally referred to as such.
Since 2010, the NCAA has had a joint contract with CBS and Turner Sports, a division of Time Warner (which co-owns the CW Television Network with CBS). The current contract runs through 2024 and, for the first time in history, provides for the nationwide broadcast each year of all games of the tournament. All First Four games air on truTV. A featured second- or third-round game in each time "window" is broadcast on CBS, while all other games are shown either on TBS, TNT or truTV. Sweet 16 (regional semifinal) games are broadcast on CBS and TBS. Through 2015, all games from the Elite Eight (regional final) onwards are shown on CBS exclusively. Beginning in 2016, CBS and TBS will split coverage of the Elite Eight. CBS and TBS will alternate coverage of the Final Four and national championship game, with TBS getting the final two rounds in even numbered years, and CBS getting the games in odd numbered years. March Madness On Demand would remain unchanged, although Turner is allowed to develop their own service.[19]
The CBS broadcast provides the NCAA with over 500 million dollars annually, and makes up over 90% of the NCAA's annual revenue.[20] The revenues from the multi-billion-dollar television contract are divided among the Division I basketball playing schools and conferences as follows:[21]
The Division I Men's Basketball tournament is the only NCAA championship tournament where the NCAA does not keep the profits.
CBS has been the major partner of the NCAA in televising the tournament for much of its history, but there have been many changes in coverage since the tournament was first broadcast in 1969.
From 1969 to 1981, the NCAA tournament aired on NBC, but not all games were televised. The early rounds, in particular, were not always seen on TV.
In 1982, CBS obtained broadcast television rights to the NCAA tournament.
The same year as CBS obtained rights to the Big Dance, ESPN began showing the opening rounds of the tournament. This was the network's first contract signed with the NCAA for a major sport, and helped to establish ESPN's following among college basketball fans. ESPN showed six first-round games on Thursday and again on Friday, with CBS then picking up a seventh game at 11:30 pm ET. Thus, 14 of 32 first-round games were televised. ESPN also re-ran games overnight. At the time, there was only one ESPN network, with no ability to split its signal regionally, so ESPN showed only the most competitive games. During the 1980s, the tournament's popularity on television soared, no doubt due to the extensive coverage provided by ESPN.
However, ESPN became a victim of its own success, as CBS was awarded the rights to cover all games of the NCAA tournament, starting in 1991. Only with the introduction of the so-called "play-in" game (between the 64 seed and the 65 seed) in the 2000s, did ESPN get back in the game (and actually, the first time this "play-in" game was played in 2001, the game was aired on TNN, using CBS graphics and announcers. CBS and TNN were both owned by Viacom at the time.)
Through 2010, CBS broadcasted the remaining 63 games of the NCAA tournament proper. Most areas saw only eight of 32 first round games, seven second round games, and four regional semifinal games (out of the possible 56 games during these rounds; there would be some exceptions to this rule in the 2000s). Coverage preempted regular programming on the network, except during a 2 hour window from about 5 ET until 7 ET when the local affiliates could show programming. The CBS format resulted in far fewer hours of first-round coverage than under the old ESPN format but allowed the games to reach a much larger audience than ESPN was able to reach.
During this period of near-exclusivity by CBS, the network provided to its local affiliates three types of feeds from each venue: constant feed, swing feed, and flex feed. Constant feeds remain primarily on a given game, and are used primarily by stations with a clear local interest in a particular game. Despite its name, a constant feed will occasionally veer away to other games for brief updates (as is typical in most American sports coverage), but coverage generally remains with the initial game. A swing feed tends to stay on games believed to be of natural interest to the locality, such as teams from local conferences, but may leave that game to go to other games that during their progress become close matches. On a flex feed, coverage bounces around from one venue to another, depending on action at the various games in progress. If one game is a blowout, coverage can switch to a more competitive game. A flex feed is provided when there are not games that have a significant natural local interest for the stations carrying them, allowing the flex game to be the best game in progress. Station feeds are planned in advance and stations have the option of requesting either constant or flex feed for various games.
In 1999, DirecTV began broadcasting all games otherwise not shown on local television with its Mega March Madness premium package. The DirecTV system used the subscriber's zip code to black out games which could be seen on broadcast television. Prior to that, all games were available on C-Band satellite and were picked up by sports bars.
In 2003, CBS struck a deal with Yahoo! to offer live streaming of the first three rounds of games under its Yahoo! Platinum service, for $16.95 a month.[23] In 2004, CBS began selling viewers access to March Madness On Demand, which provided games not otherwise shown on broadcast television; the service was free for AOL subscribers.[24] In 2006, March Madness On Demand was made free, and continues to be so today to online users.
In addition, CBS College Sports Network (formerly CSTV) had broadcast two "late early" games that would not otherwise be broadcast nationally. These were the second games in the daytime session in the Pacific Time Zone, to avoid starting games before 10 AM. These games are also available via March Madness on Demand and on CBS affiliates in the market areas of the team playing. In other markets, newscasts, local programming or preempted CBS morning programming are aired. CBS-CS is scheduled to continue broadcasting the official pregame and postgame shows and press conferences from the teams involved.[25]
NCAA partner AT&T Mobility also broadcasts all games via the MobiTV infrastructure, which is available on phones compatible with AT&T's Mobile TV service. For the iPhone, a premium-charge application is available via the App Store to watch the games.
The Final Four has been broadcast in HDTV since 1999. From 2000 to 2004, only one first/second round site and one regional site were designated as HDTV sites. In 2005, all regional games were broadcast in HDTV, and four first and second round sites were designated for HDTV coverage. Local stations broadcasting in both digital and analog had the option of airing separate games on their HD and SD channels, to take advantage of the available high definition coverage. Beginning in 2007, all games in the tournament (including all first and second round games) were available in high definition, and local stations were required to air the same game on both their analog and digital channels. However, due to satellite limitations, first round "constant" feeds were only available in standard definition.[26] Moreover, some digital television stations, such as WRAL-TV in Raleigh, North Carolina, choose to not participate in HDTV broadcasts of the first and second rounds and the regional semifinals, and used their available bandwidth to split their signal into digital subchannels to show all games going on simultaneously.[27] By 2008, upgrades at the CBS broadcast center allowed all feeds, flex and constant, to be in HD for the tournament.
Though it is an American sporting event, the NCAA Men's Basketball tournament is watched in some other countries.
These are the lowest seeds to reach each round since expansion to 64 teams in 1985:
No team as a #16 seed has ever defeated a #1 seed since the field was expanded to 64 teams, though on four occasions, a #16 seed has come within a single basket of winning:
As noted above, despite numerous instances of early-round tournament upsets, no #1 seed has ever lost in the first round to a #16 seed. However, while seeding is one way of measuring the impact of an upset, prior to the implementation of seeding, point spread was the better determinant of an upset, and a loss by a highly favored team remains for many the definition of "upset".
While people are often fascinated by the improbable Cinderella stories, sometimes unusual things have happened with the top-seeded teams, as well.
Has happened only once, in 2008, when Kansas, North Carolina, UCLA, and Memphis all won their regionals. (Memphis's season was later vacated by the NCAA due to use of an ineligible player). Derrick Rose
Has happened six times:
Has happened three times:
The following teams entered the tournament ranked #1 in at least one of the AP, UPI, or USA Today polls and won the tournament:[30]
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The NCAA tournament has undergone dramatic expansion since the 1970s, and since the tournament was expanded to 48 teams in 1980, no undefeated teams have failed to qualify. But before that, there were six occasions on which a team achieved perfection in the regular season, yet did not appear in the NCAA tournament.
There have been six times in which the tournament did not include the reigning champion (the previous year's winner):
In 2011, John Calipari also accomplished that feat, taking Kentucky (2011) to the Final Four after also reaching the tournament's last weekend previously with Memphis (2008) and UMass (1996). The latter two tournament appearances were later vacated due to NCAA sanctions on those programs.
Point differentials, or margin of victory, can be viewed either by the championship game, or by a team's performance over the whole tournament.
30 points, by UNLV in 1990 (103-73, over Duke)
Seven times the championship game has been tied at the end of regulation. On one of those occasions (1957) the game went into double and then triple overtime.
1 point, on six occasions
Achieved seven times by six different schools
Since the inception of the 64-team tournament in 1985, each seed-pairing has played a total of 108 first-round games, with the following results:
This table lists all the cities that have hosted the Final Four, as well as what stadiums the Final Four was played in. For additional information about a particular year's tournament, click on the year to go directly to that year's NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament.
Year | City | Venue | Champion |
---|---|---|---|
1939 | Evanston, Illinois | Patten Gymnasium | Oregon |
1940 | Kansas City, Missouri | Municipal Auditorium | Indiana |
1941 | Kansas City, Missouri | Municipal Auditorium | Wisconsin |
1942 | Kansas City, Missouri | Municipal Auditorium | Stanford |
1943 | New York City | Madison Square Garden | Wyoming |
1944 | New York City | Madison Square Garden | Utah |
1945 | New York City | Madison Square Garden | Oklahoma A&M |
1946 | New York City | Madison Square Garden | Oklahoma A&M |
1947 | New York City | Madison Square Garden | Holy Cross |
1948 | New York City | Madison Square Garden | Kentucky |
1949 | Seattle, Washington | Hec Edmundson Pavilion | Kentucky |
1950 | New York City | Madison Square Garden | CCNY |
1951 | Minneapolis, Minnesota | Williams Arena | Kentucky |
1952 | Seattle, Washington | Hec Edmundson Pavilion | Kansas |
1953 | Kansas City, Missouri | Municipal Auditorium | Indiana |
1954 | Kansas City, Missouri | Municipal Auditorium | LaSalle |
1955 | Kansas City, Missouri | Municipal Auditorium | San Francisco |
1956 | Evanston, Illinois | McGaw Hall | San Francisco |
1957 | Kansas City, Missouri | Municipal Auditorium | North Carolina |
1958 | Louisville, Kentucky | Freedom Hall | Kentucky |
1959 | Louisville, Kentucky | Freedom Hall | California |
1960 | San Francisco | Cow Palace | Ohio State |
1961 | Kansas City, Missouri | Municipal Auditorium | Cincinnati |
1962 | Louisville, Kentucky | Freedom Hall | Cincinnati |
1963 | Louisville, Kentucky | Freedom Hall | Loyola Chicago |
1964 | Kansas City, Missouri | Municipal Auditorium | UCLA |
1965 | Portland, Oregon | Memorial Collesium | UCLA |
1966 | College Park, Maryland | Cole Field House | UTEP |
1967 | Louisville, Kentucky | Freedom Hall | UCLA |
1968 | Los Angeles | Sports Arena | UCLA |
1969 | Louisville, Kentucky | Freedom Hall | UCLA |
1970 | College Park, Maryland | Cole Field House | UCLA |
1971 | Houston, Texas | Astrodome | UCLA |
1972 | Los Angeles | Memorial Sports Arena | UCLA |
1973 | St. Louis, Missouri | St. Louis Arena | UCLA |
1974 | Greensboro, North Carolina | Greensboro Coliseum | NC State |
1975 | San Diego, California | San Diego Sports Arena | UCLA |
1976 | Philadelphia | The Spectrum | Indiana |
1977 | Atlanta, Georgia | The Omni | Marquette |
1978 | St. Louis, Missouri | The Checkerdome | Kentucky |
1979 | Salt Lake City | Special Events Center | Michigan State |
1980 | Indianapolis, Indiana | Market Square Arena | Louisville |
1981 | Philadelphia | The Spectrum | Indiana |
1982 | New Orleans | Louisiana Superdome | North Carolina |
1983 | Albuquerque, New Mexico | The Pit | NC State |
1984 | Seattle, Washington | Kingdome | Georgetown |
1985 | Lexington, Kentucky | Rupp Arena | Villanova |
1986 | Dallas, Texas | Reunion Arena | Louisville |
1987 | New Orleans | Louisiana Superdome | Indiana |
1988 | Kansas City, Missouri | Kemper Arena | Kansas |
1989 | Seattle, Washington | Kingdome | Michigan |
1990 | Denver, Colorado | McNichols Sports Arena | UNLV |
1991 | Indianapolis, Indiana | Hoosier Dome | Duke |
1992 | Minneapolis, Minnesota | HHH Metrodome | Duke |
1993 | New Orleans | Louisiana Superdome | North Carolina |
1994 | Charlotte, North Carolina | Charlotte Coliseum | Arkansas |
1995 | Seattle, Washington | Kingdome | UCLA |
1996 | East Rutherford, New Jersey | Continental Airlines Arena | Kentucky |
1997 | Indianapolis, Indiana | RCA Dome | Arizona |
1998 | San Antonio, Texas | Alamodome | Kentucky |
1999 | St. Petersburg, Florida | Tropicana Field | Connecticut |
2000 | Indianapolis, Indiana | RCA Dome | Michigan State |
2001 | Minneapolis, Minnesota | HHH Metrodome | Duke |
2002 | Atlanta, Georgia | Georgia Dome | Maryland |
2003 | New Orleans | Mercedes-Benz Superdome | Syracuse |
2004 | San Antonio, Texas | Alamodome | Connecticut |
2005 | St. Louis, Missouri | Edward Jones Dome | North Carolina |
2006 | Indianapolis, Indiana | RCA Dome | Florida |
2007 | Atlanta, Georgia | Georgia Dome | Florida |
2008 | San Antonio, Texas | Alamodome | Kansas |
2009 | Detroit, Michigan | Ford Field | North Carolina |
2010 | Indianapolis, Indiana | Lucas Oil Stadium | Duke |
2011 | Houston, Texas | Reliant Stadium | Connecticut |
2012 | New Orleans | Mercedes-Benz Superdome | |
2013 | Atlanta, Georgia | Georgia Dome | |
2014 | Arlington, Texas | Cowboys Stadium | |
2015 | Indianapolis, Indiana | Lucas Oil Stadium | |
2016 | Houston, Texas | Reliant Stadium |
School | Titles | Years |
---|---|---|
Arizona | 1 | 1997 |
Arkansas | 1 | 1994 |
California | 1 | 1959 |
Cincinnati | 2 | 1961, 1962 |
CCNY | 1 | 1950 |
Connecticut | 3 | 1999, 2004, 2011 |
Duke | 4 | 1991, 1992, 2001, 2010 |
Florida | 2 | 2006, 2007 |
Georgetown | 1 | 1984 |
Holy Cross | 1 | 1947 |
Indiana | 5 | 1940, 1953, 1976, 1981, 1987 |
Kansas | 3 | 1952, 1988, 2008 |
Kentucky | 7 | 1948, 1949, 1951, 1958, 1978, 1996, 1998 |
La Salle | 1 | 1954 |
Louisville | 2 | 1980, 1986 |
Loyola (Chicago) | 1 | 1963 |
Marquette | 1 | 1977 |
Maryland | 1 | 2002 |
Michigan | 1 | 1989 |
Michigan State | 2 | 1979, 2000 |
North Carolina | 5 | 1957, 1982, 1993, 2005, 2009 |
North Carolina State | 2 | 1974, 1983 |
Ohio State | 1 | 1960 |
Oklahoma State (Oklahoma A&M*) | 2 | 1945, 1946 |
Oregon | 1 | 1939 |
San Francisco | 2 | 1955, 1956 |
Stanford | 1 | 1942 |
Syracuse | 1 | 2003 |
UCLA | 11 | 1964, 1965, 1967, 1968, 1969, 1970, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1995 |
UNLV | 1 | 1990 |
UTEP (Then known as: Texas Western College) | 1 | 1966 |
Utah | 1 | 1944 |
Villanova | 1 | 1985 |
Wisconsin | 1 | 1941 |
Wyoming | 1 | 1943 |
Year | Team | Record* | Result |
---|---|---|---|
1951 | Columbia | 21β0 | Lost in the first round to Illinois |
1956 | San Francisco | 24β0 | Won the tournament |
1957 | North Carolina | 27β0 | Won the tournament |
1961 | Ohio State | 24β0 | Lost in the championship game to Cincinnati |
1964 | UCLA | 26β0 | Won the tournament |
1967 | UCLA | 26β0 | Won the tournament |
1968 | Houston | 28β0 | Lost in the national semifinal game to UCLA |
1968 | St. Bonaventure | 22β0 | Lost Sweet Sixteen game to North Carolina |
1971 | Marquette | 26β0 | Lost Sweet Sixteen game to Ohio State |
1972 | UCLA | 26β0 | Won the tournament |
1973 | UCLA | 26β0 | Won the tournament |
1975 | Indiana | 29β0 | Lost Elite Eight game to Kentucky |
1976 | Indiana | 27β0 | Won the tournament |
1976 | Rutgers | 27β0 | Lost in the national semifinal game to Michigan |
1979 | Indiana State | 28β0 | Lost in the championship game to Michigan State |
1991 | UNLV | 30β0 | Lost in the national semifinal game to Duke |
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