The first step in any methodology is to decide what is to be looked at followed by how.

To determine which basketball programs to look at, I decided to begin by looking at the programs with the most wins and the programs with the highest winning percentages.

Since I knew this was going to be a piece about the 40 greatest programs of all-time, I thought that I should probably start off with close to double that number to examine. So, when examining these lists, I decided to make 1250 total wins (78 programs have achieved this) and .566 winning percentage (80 programs have achieved this) as the minimum cut-off as my starting point.

When combining the two lists I noticed that a total of 64 programs had achieved at least 1285 wins and a .567 winning percentage. I then examined the 14 programs that had achieved 1250 wins or more but had not achieved 1285 wins and determined that only 1 of those programs was even close to the .566 (at .564) winning percentage and since this program belonged to a conference that I have a certain bias against, I decided for the sake of being impartial to include this program as number 65.

I then matched and compared the two lists (all-time wins and all-time winning percentages) and came up with the Top 40 programs based upon these two criteria alone and awarded points as follows:

1-5 received 8 points each
5-10 received 7 points each
11-15 received 6 points each
16-20 received 5 points each
21-25 received 4 points each
26-30 received 3 points each
31-35 received 2 points each
36-40 received 1 point each

Once I examined the new list of 65, I knew it was missing some programs I would consider better than others on the list mainly because these programs may not have been around long enough to attain 1285 total wins. However, these programs have done well in a shorter period of time than others and have done well during post-season tournaments.

So the next step was to examine post season tournament results. Often, fans throw around that their favorite program has won 'X' amount NCs and been to 'X' amount of Final Fours and Elite 8s, but I find this can be misleading. After all, between 1939 - 1950, only 8 teams made it to the NCAAs, so all participants can claim an Elite 8. Silly, huh?

So the next step for me was to determine how I was going to weight post-season results factoring in the fact that current NCAAs are much different than when they began; factoring in NIT results (often overlooked by professionals who attempt such lists as this); and pseudo-champions from prior to NCAA/NIT tournaments.

Since the NCAA Men’s Basketball Guide includes the Helms’ Foundation National Champions prior to there being a tournament, I decided to award 1 point to a program for being named the NC for a given year by the Helms’ Foundation.

For the NIT, I decided to award 2 points for each champion through the 1973-74 season and 1 point for the runner-up. I chose the 73-74 season since it was that year in which NC State won the NC and David Thompson made his now infamous remark about the NIT being for ‘losers’. Also, the following season was when the NCAAs expanded to 32 teams.

For the NCAAs, I decided that I would base points in the following manner:

1939-1950 – 2 points for NC, 1 point for being RU (Runner-Up)
1950-1974 – 3 points for NC, 2 points for RU, 1 point for FF (Final Four)
1975-1982 – 4 points for NC, 3 points for RU, 2 points for FF, 1 point for E8 (Elite 8).
1983-now – 5 points for NC, 4 points for RU, 3 points for FF, 2 points for E8, 1 point for S16 (Sweet 16).

I then went to the record books and did the calculations of post-season points for all teams and as a result, I added another 5 programs who each had earned at least 10 post-season points to the above 65 for final review.

So, in the Final Analysis of my study, I reviewed a total of 70 basketball programs to come up with the 40 Greatest BB Programs of All-Time.

Next up – The Results.

Cheers,
Neil

Sounds good Neil. I'm sure people will have differing opinions on your results and possibly the scoring, but its based on a system so it will be interesting to see and thanks for the work.

omnicarrier Wrote:For the NIT, I decided to award 2 points for each champion through the 1973-74 season and 1 point for the runner-up. I chose the 73-74 season since it was that year in which NC State won the NC and David Thompson made his now infamous remark about the NIT being for ‘losers’. Also, the following season was when the NCAAs expanded to 32 teams.

For the NCAAs, I decided that I would base points in the following manner:

1939-1950 – 2 points for NC, 1 point for being RU (Runner-Up)
1950-1974 – 3 points for NC, 2 points for RU, 1 point for FF (Final Four)
1975-1982 – 4 points for NC, 3 points for RU, 2 points for FF, 1 point for E8 (Elite 8).
1983-now – 5 points for NC, 4 points for RU, 3 points for FF, 2 points for E8, 1 point for S16 (Sweet 16).

Thanks for taking the time to do this. I'm sure it took a lot of effort!

One question. IIRC, Prior to 1954 (?) I think teams could play in the NCAA and NIT tourneys. After 1954, you could only play in one or the other. Should this be taken into account in your points system? Maybe you already did with your no FF points for the NIT?

Hoquista Wrote:

omnicarrier Wrote:For the NIT, I decided to award 2 points for each champion through the 1973-74 season and 1 point for the runner-up. I chose the 73-74 season since it was that year in which NC State won the NC and David Thompson made his now infamous remark about the NIT being for ‘losers’. Also, the following season was when the NCAAs expanded to 32 teams.

For the NCAAs, I decided that I would base points in the following manner:

1939-1950 – 2 points for NC, 1 point for being RU (Runner-Up)
1950-1974 – 3 points for NC, 2 points for RU, 1 point for FF (Final Four)
1975-1982 – 4 points for NC, 3 points for RU, 2 points for FF, 1 point for E8 (Elite 8).
1983-now – 5 points for NC, 4 points for RU, 3 points for FF, 2 points for E8, 1 point for S16 (Sweet 16).

Thanks for taking the time to do this. I'm sure it took a lot of effort!

One question. IIRC, Prior to 1954 (?) I think teams could play in the NCAA and NIT tourneys. After 1954, you could only play in one or the other. Should this be taken into account in your points system? Maybe you already did with your no FF points for the NIT?

Keep in mind, I didn't award points for making a tournament, only points for how teams performed once in a tournament.

Of the the 70 programs in the Final Review, multiple points for performing well in both the NIT and the NCAAs only occurred with Bradley, in 1950, when they were the Runner-Ups for both tournaments.

Since it only involved one extra point, I decided it wasn't significant enough to warrant any special treatment.

Cheers,
Neil

omnicarrier Wrote:Of the the 70 programs in the Final Review, multiple points for performing well in both the NIT and the NCAAs only occurred with Bradley, in 1950, when they were the Runner-Ups for both tournaments.

Since it only involved one extra point, I decided it wasn't significant enough to warrant any special treatment.

Cheers,
Neil

That's interesting although I actually don't know who has competed in both AND done well. Bradley in 1950 has to be the answer to a trivia question somewhere.

Any chance you are going to post the results of each teams individual points for each criteria at the end?

Would it be possible to see a list of the teams that were evaluated. 70 seems like a fair amount of teams, but I'd be worried that some teams were skipped, maybe from the mid-major conferences. I'm curious if some teams that had auto-bid opportunities to make the tourney might be left out.

For example, these two teams are from the same state:

Team A has 17 NCAA appearances, 5 NITs, 14 conference championships with a 10-19 record in the NCAAs due to the old consolation and third place games the NCAA tourney used to have. Team A has a Final Four appearance.

Team B has 11 NCAA appearances, 16 NITs, 3 conference championships with a 6-12 record in the NCAAs.

Team B has the higher profile nationally and within its own state, but I'd be curious to know if both teams were evaulated if you could show the list. I'll reveal the teams I'm thinking of at that point.

I'll post a hint. They play a home-home series every year, but are not in the same conference. That should narrow it down quite a bit.

mattsarz Wrote:Would it be possible to see a list of the teams that were evaluated. 70 seems like a fair amount of teams, but I'd be worried that some teams were skipped, maybe from the mid-major conferences. I'm curious if some teams that had auto-bid opportunities to make the tourney might be left out.

For example, these two teams are from the same state:

Team A has 17 NCAA appearances, 5 NITs, 14 conference championships with a 10-19 record in the NCAAs due to the old consolation and third place games the NCAA tourney used to have. Team A has a Final Four appearance.

Team B has 11 NCAA appearances, 16 NITs, 3 conference championships with a 6-12 record in the NCAAs.

Team B has the higher profile nationally and within its own state, but I'd be curious to know if both teams were evaulated if you could show the list. I'll reveal the teams I'm thinking of at that point.

I'll post a hint. They play a home-home series every year, but are not in the same conference. That should narrow it down quite a bit.

Hail Matt,

Below are the 70 programs listed alphabetically that were in the Final Review.


Akron
Alabama
Arizona
Arkansas
Bradley
Brigham Young
Cincinnati
Connecticut
Creighton
Dayton
DePaul
Duke
Florida
Georgetown
Houston
Illinois
Illinois State
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kansas State
Kentucky
Louisiana State
Louisville
Marquette
Marshall
Maryland
Memphis
Michigan
Michigan State
Minnesota
Missouri
Murray State
North Carolina
North Carolina State
Notre Dame
Ohio
Ohio State
Oklahoma
Oklahoma State
Oregon State
Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh
Princeton
Providence
Purdue
Rhode Island
Santa Clara
Seton Hall
Southern California
Southern Illinois
St. John's
St. Joseph's
Stanford
Syracuse
Temple
Tennessee
Texas
UCLA
UNLV
Utah
Utah State
Vanderbilt
Villanova
Virginia
Wake Forest
Washington
West Virginia
Western Kentucky
Wyoming

Cheers,
Neil

The two programs listed were New Mexico St. and New Mexico.

mattsarz Wrote:The two programs listed were New Mexico St. and New Mexico.

Neither made it the list of Top 78 programs in terms of wins nor Top 80 programs in terms of winning percentage.

And when I did the post-season points count, neither name really came up significantly enough to be added to the Final Review list.

Remember, in this system, there were no points awarded simply for making an NIT or NCAAs, the points were awarded on reaching certain performance measures, depending upon the tourney and the year.

Cheers,
Neil

Ohio had an elite eight in 1964 and was ranked #5 in 1968 for two weeks. They also beat five Big Ten teams in one single season during the early 1970's. No Mid major has ever done that kind of damage to the Big Ten. They week two top 10 Big Ten teams in the same week that year Ohio State and Indiana. Ohio was far stronger in the 60's and early 1970's as they played the great top 10 teams of Loyola-Chicago, Cincinnati, Ohio State, Indiana, Marquette and Louisville home and home games and they won often. After a while the power schools decided they wanted no part of playing road games non conference and things changed overtime as the program faded as the big games vs the Big Ten and sellouts disappeared. The ESPN Era has put teams like Connecticut into the top of college basketball. Before Calhoun UConn was a Big East bottom feeder with Seton Hall. St John's and Georgetown ruled the East in those early days along with Syracuse and Villanova. Teams like Houston, UNLV, Depaul have faded like St John's over the last 20 years.

Metro Conference was a league that produced some great basketball and included Memphis and Louisville which were the big boys of that league. Louisville and Memphis built there programs into national powers. Cincinnati was great in the 60's and later under Huggins in the last 20 years. Future Big East teams like Notre Dame, Marquette, and Depaul often played on national TV vs UCLA every year. ACC wasn't much until the 1980's as Jordan, Sampson and others put that conference on the map. The addition of at-large bids in the late 1970's early 80's changed basketball as the power conferences were able to get multiple teams in to the tournament. The older brackets of the 1960's and 1970's had a higher % of midmajors than today.

OUBOBCATJOHN Wrote:ACC wasn't much until the 1980's as Jordan, Sampson and others put that conference on the map.

Gotta disagree with that one

ACC appearances in the Final Four between 1950-1980

1950 NC State
1957 UNC (champion)
1962 Wake Forest
1963 Duke
1964 Duke (runner-up)
1966 Duke
1967 UNC
1968 UNC (runner-up)
1969 UNC
1972 UNC
1974 NC State (champion)
1977 UNC (runner-up)

Plus wasn't the field mostly conference champs and no at-larges at all? That's pretty good.

Tack on the following from the NIT Final Four

1971 UNC (champ)
1971 Duke
1972 Maryland (champ)
1973 UNC
1976 NC State
1978 NC State (runner-up)

I'd say they were a fairly healthy confernce.

mattsarz Wrote:Plus wasn't the field mostly conference champs and no at-larges at all?

Yest, that started in 1975.

Other tidbits:
32-team bracket was adopted. For the first time, teams other than the conference champions could be cho¬sen at-large. No conference could be represented by more than two teams. Sixteen teams qualified as conference champions, four others as champions from the four regional tournaments which were conducted by the ECAC, and the committee selected the other 12 at-large.

More here about the history:
http://www.ncaasports.com/basketball/mens/story/9033549

I'm too young to remember this, but what were these ECAC tournaments? When I see look at Wikipedia for example, Syracuse was listed as Independent (ECAC Upstate) for 1975, Rutgers was Independent (ECAC Metro) for 1976. Did a slew of schools fall under the ECAC grouping, then the ECAC would divide the teams up into tournaments based on location?

mattsarz Wrote:I'm too young to remember this, but what were these ECAC tournaments? When I see look at Wikipedia for example, Syracuse was listed as Independent (ECAC Upstate) for 1975, Rutgers was Independent (ECAC Metro) for 1976. Did a slew of schools fall under the ECAC grouping, then the ECAC would divide the teams up into tournaments based on location?

I've mesaged you a long story about this - that also includes the formation of many conferences within the North East (ECAC region). It should answer your question? If anyone else wants it just message me.

The ECAC before the advent of the Big East and all the other new conferences was kinda like a super conference that kept no league standings...more like an affiliation.

The ECAC Upstate NY region was Syr, St. Bona, Canisius and Niagara...as I remember the top two teams (as chosen) would square off in a game (usually in Rochester). The winner would get a spot in the NCAAs. The loser could still get an NCAA slot but more likely an NIT bid or nothing. IIRC correctly the auto NCAA slots dropped in number and the Upstate winner had to have a second game versus the ECAC South (usually Old Dominion, VCU, etc...) This only happened for about 5 years in the mid/late 70s.

TexanMark Wrote:The ECAC Upstate NY region was Syr, St. Bona, Canisius and Niagara

Wow. The Little 3 and the Big One. At the town I grew up in, my best friend went to Bona, my sister went to Niagara, I went to Canisius.