Photo Courtesy of ESPN
March Madness has ended, and UConn has been crowned as the National Title Winners. The nation watched this 2023 college basketball tournament with fascination as upsets occurred almost daily and star players became household names. Here’s a look at some of the biggest takeaways from the tournament.
1. Seeds Don’t Matter as Much
In this year’s tournament, no one-seeds made the Elite Eight, and the Final Four consisted of a four-seed, two five-seeds, and a nine-seed, which is far from your typical tournament Final Four. In the first round, one-seed Purdue lost to 16-seed Fairleigh Dickinson University. In addition, two-seed Arizona was upset by fifteen-seed Princeton, the new Ivy League Basketball darling.
Seeding has become less important in the modern age of recruiting and reborn transfer portal. Coaches now have more access to recruits with YouTube, Twitter, Hudl, and more making it easier for smaller schools to find those diamonds in the rough. Princeton, who made their way to the Sweet Sixteen as a fifteen-seed had just one player who was ranked coming out of high school on their roster. The talent pool has evened out in college basketball between the top-seeded power five schools and a lower-seeded small school team.
2. 15 Seeds Win!
In this tournament, we saw Princeton make a Cinderella run to Sweet Sixteen as a 15 seed. This is the third straight year a fifteen seed has gone to Sweet Sixteen, with Oral Roberts in 2021, St. Peters in 2022, and now Princeton in 2023. It will be interesting to see if this trend continues in 2024. Fifteen seeds have proven they can win not just one game but multiple to make a sweet Cinderella run.
3. A 16 Seed Won…Again
Fairleigh Dickinson University, a small school in New Jersey that had the shortest Division One Men’s Basketball roster with an average height of 6’2, beat modern powerhouse Purdue. The FDU Knights did the impossible for the second time ever just five years after the University of Maryland Baltimore County stunned Virginia as a sixteen seed. Back when UMBC pulled the first-ever 16-over-1 upset, it was hailed as a once-in-a-lifetime event. Instead, five years later, FDU pulled the same act. Could sixteen-seeds actually win a game or two every few years? FDU and UMBC forever remain in the history books.
4. Are Blue Bloods Done?
Blue Bloods are schools that have traditionally done very well in college basketball and tend to have blue on the jersey or logo. Teams like Duke, North Carolina, Kansas, Kentucky, UCLA, and more recently Villanova are schools that fit this label. North Carolina made history this year but not the good kind, as they were ranked number one nationally in the first AP poll of the season but failed the tournament this year, not exactly the usual Michael Jordan-esque reputation the school maintains in college basketball.
Kansas, a one-seed and defending national champion didn’t even make the Sweet Sixteen while Duke and Kentucky lost in the second round to Tennessee and Kansas State respectively. However, two-seed UCLA did make the Sweet Sixteen despite missing Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year Jaylen Clark with an injury. Still, it seems like a forecast for the future of college basketball, and the mighty Blue Bloods might be dying a slow and painful death seen on the court by the nation this March.
5. Is UConn Back?
UConn won the National Championship in dominating fashion with a 76-59 win over San Diego State, winning their fifth national title in program history. The Huskies may soon return to consistent winning days after winning the national title, and may finally have gained that coveted Blue Blood status. It seems that UConn basketball is back as Huskie Nation rejoices in their victorious March.
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