Greatest NCAA Tournament Upset of All-Time?

by user Pean

Every March, America falls in love with a new NCAA Tournament Cinderella. Rarely does one of these teams advance past a few rounds, let alone make the Final Four. On Saturday night, 11th Seed George Mason continued their magical tournament success with a stunning upset over #1 Seed Connecticut. George Mason barely made the Tournament itself coming from small Colonial Athletic Conference. Can this be considered the greatest upset of all Time in the NCAA Tournament? Let's look at some of the facts

• They were the 11th seed
• They are not from one of the Power Six Conferences
• They didn't win *their own* Conference tournament
• They beat the top team from the top Conference (Big East) to make the Final Four
• They came into the tournament never having won a tourney game
• They won the first game without their 2nd leading scorer who was suspended.
• They beat 3 of 6 previous champions along the way (Michigan State 2000, UNC 2005, UCONN 2004).

Here are some of the other games considered to be the greatest upsets.

NC State 54, Houston 52

April 4, 1983 NCAA Championship Game

Everyone has seen the famous highlight of NC State's Lorenzo Charles catching his teammatesDereck Whittenburg's desperation three-point airball, only to dunk it home as time expired. They also remember the late Jimmy Valvano, coach of NC State running around the court looking for someone to hug. The dunk gave NC State a stunning upset over #1 ranked (and heavily favorite) Houston, who had Akeem Olajuwon, Clyde Drexler, Larry Micheaux, Michael Young and Benny Anders. Four of those players would go on the NBA, and 2 (Olajuwon and Drexler) would be named to the 50 greatest NBA players of All-Time.

Villanova 66, Georgetown 64

April 1, 1985 NCAA Championship Game

Georgetown, led by All-American Patrick Ewing, dominated the entire season and was looking to win their 2nd consecutive NCAA Championship. Rollie Massimino's Villanova came in as the 8th seed in their region, and was given absolutely no chance against the potential dynasty team. However, Nova shot an NCAA-record 78.6 percent (22 of 28) from the field against the nation's top-ranked defense, on their way to an improbable national championship.

Date

Mon 03/27/06, 8:58 am EST <pageTools></pageTools>

DNLLegend

1326 days ago

Score -1

The main reason why this upset was awful is because George Mason was underrated. This is a team that, despite a creampuff schedule and their CAA status, cracked the top 25. Their two losses to Hofstra notwithstanding, there was no reason that Mason gets an 11 seed. Had they won the CAA tourney, they'd certainly get an 8, minimum. They probably deserved an 8 anyway.

Now, put them as the 8 seed and give them a second round matchup with UConn. They pull the same upset. It's not even close to a big deal -- things like that happen all the time.

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PeanMajor Leaguer

1326 days ago

Score 0

well you know what, they lost the CAA and your team slept walked through the entire NCAA's

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Anonymous Fanatic #1

1326 days ago

Score 5

A team from the CAA who has never won a ncaa torunament game, loses their conference tournament, suspends their second leading scorer for the first round of the ncaa tournament, has 0 of it's player rectruited by big schools, has no one over 6'7", beats Michigan State, UNC, and UConn on their way to the final 4. Your right, that happens every year.

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PeanMajor Leaguer

1326 days ago

Score 0

ha!

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RoblefkoLegend

1326 days ago

Score 3

i agree with you somewhat Dan. If George Mason beat MSU and then lost in the next game, or even bear MSU and UNC and then lost in the game following that I would consider that a huge upset. But any team that beats a 6, 3, 7 and 1 seed in consecutive games means they never deserved to be an 11 seed in the first place and so I dont think any of their victories were upsets but rather a bad job by everyone who has a say in the AP rankings and NCAA seedings when determining how good George Mason really is.

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Anonymous Fanatic #2

1326 days ago

Score 0

I'd go with Nova in 85.

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DNLLegend

1326 days ago

Score -1

Rob: Exactly. George Mason was, again, a top 25 team at one point. Had seeds come out that day, we're talking an 8 seed at a minimum. Instead, they're given an 11. That's a huge difference. 8 seeds beat 1 seeds all the time and it's no big deal. For an example, see again the Villanova team from 1985. They had to beat two #1s and two #2s that year, but no one considers their victory over #1 Michigan in the second round to be a collosal upset.

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JwhalenPee Wee

1326 days ago

Score 1

it was the greatest NCAA upset of all time. it would have been close with the nova game but the fact the uconn miraculously pushed the game to OT and still lost pushed it over the edge. uconn has at least 4 guys who will be nba players. they have a HOF coach. they were considered the best team in the country all year. who cares if mason was in the top 25 for a week. the polls dont mean anything - see george washington.

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PeanMajor Leaguer

1326 days ago

Score 0

Villanova was also from the Big East and had a future NBA player in Pickney...i think its more important in that they came from such a small conference.

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Anonymous Fanatic #3

1326 days ago

Score 0

http://www.h...ID=PMRS26316 Check it out.

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Chiefs Fan 1

1326 days ago

Score 1

I'm new to this site

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Anonymous Fanatic #4

1326 days ago

Score 0

welcome Chiefs Fan

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Anonymous Fanatic #5

1326 days ago

Score 1

I submitted a comment several sentences long and all that displayed is, "I'm new to this site. Can someone tell me why this is? Thanks!

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Anonymous Fanatic #5

1326 days ago

Score 3

Thank you for the welcome. I'll try to post again on this subject. I see that many posts argue that G.Mason should have been a higher seed. What I haven't seen is a post mentioning all of those so-called "Professional Analysts" that complained that G.Mason shouldn't have been awarded a selection to the tounament at all, at any seed. So my question is, for those of you that think they should have been a higher seed, did you feel this way when the brackets were first introduced, or did it take G.Mason beating Michigan State, N.Carolina and UCONN for you to feel they should have been a higher seed? Hind-sight is 20/20 :-)

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DNLLegend

1326 days ago

Score 0

ChiefsFan -- I had them in my Sweet 16, so I thought they were underrated.

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Chiefs Fan 1

1325 days ago

Score 0

I didn't know enough about them prior to the tourney, so I can't speak intelligently on the subject. I just find it interesting that some of the same guys that complained that they souldn't have even been invited to participate in the tournament are now saying that they were seeded too low. Wow! Talk about flip-flopping :-)

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Anonymous Fanatic #6

976 days ago

Score 0

When NC State won as a #6 seed, there were only 48 teams in the tournament. So, a 6 abck then was actually more like a 9 today. Plus (READ THIS CAREFULLY) they HAD to win their conference tournament to get in, period. So, that makes them the best Cinderella to date.

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Anonymous Fanatic #7

970 days ago

Score 0

What is the lowest scoring game in NCAA tournament history?

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