The Death of the NCAA Cinderella

The NCAA should really clear up its fine print in marketing its basketball tournament. March Madness is known for upsets and big moments, but in reality those compelling stories that generally make the tournament worth watching happen in the first and second rounds. In fact, if you’re an underdog, you have virtually no chance of winning the modern day national championship.

This is not to say that marquee matchups—like this weekend’s final four and today’s title—are not interesting, but for the most part they are not as exciting as seeing Vermont make it to the second round or Bucknell, a tiny school from the middle of nowhere, Pa., topple mighty Kansas.

The problem is that only the powerhouses have the manpower to rattle off six straight wins en route to a title.

Since 1990, 10 top-seeded teams have cut down the nets at the final. Only two five-seeds have made it to the championship game. Both lost. Florida fell to top-seeded Michigan State 89-76 in 2001 after squeezing out of the first round with a 69-68 overtime win over Butler, and in 2003, Maryland beat fifth-seeded Indiana 64-52 in Hooiser coach Mike Davis’ second season with the team. Davis’ squad has struggled since vying for that title, but his team’s march to the final was certainly one of the more compelling stories of recent NCAA tournament memory.

Second-seeds Duke in 1991 and Kentucky in 1998 as well as fourth-seeded Arizona in 1997 and third-seeded Syracuse in 2003 all won titles; however, Arizona was the only one of those squads to knock off a top-seed in the final.

The tournament’s appeal comes in two forms—the buzz surrounding Cinderellas, and the marquee matchups that stock the later rounds. It’s our nature to root for the underdog, making the classic 12-5 upset a critical component of the tournament.

As teams enter the elite eight and eventually final four it is harder to conceive of Vermont beating Syracuse, therefore transforming the tournament into a battle of titans instead of David and Goliath.

This year, fifth-seeded Villanova almost took down the mighty North Carolina Tar Heels, but Roy Williams’ team was too powerful to fall to a team from the Big East.

There certainly have been lower-seeded teams that progressed to the later rounds, but they are more the statistical extremes than the norm.

Larry Brown’s 1988 Kansas squad was a six-seed when it won the championship, as was NC State back in 1983. Of course, the lowest-seeded team to win a national title was the 1985 Villanova squad, seeded seventh in the tourney, that stunned top-seeded Georgetown 66-64 in the final and handily beat North Carolina in the elite eight. Villanova’s title run was slightly more likely than the 1987 stock market crash.

Tonight’s final is compelling for reasons beyond the fact that these two powerhouses are the best teams in college basketball right now. Experts talk about how UNC’s talent is unprecedented and Illinois has better team chemistry.The matchup, though, goes beyond the players. Roy Williams has yet to cut down the nets at a championship game and Bruce Weber, in his second season, was able to lead his team to the title round in spite of his off-court tragedies. Both teams, though, were expected to be playing this game.

It has been almost 20 years since the NCAA had a true Cinderella win a title. And, with 65 teams entering the tournament every year, eventually it has to happen. It’s time for the market to crash again.