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Message: [QUOTE="SWC75, post: 222126, member: 289"] Jim Boeheim wondered if it might be true, as many have said, that a conference tourney champion usually doesn’t win the NCAA championship. We’ve won the BET five times but none of those teams even made it to the Sweet 16, (one didn’t even make it to the tournament). Our sole national champions lost in the semi-finals, just as we had done when Jim made that statement. Naturally, I decided to look it up. Here are the NCAA Tournament champions and how they faired in any conference tournament: 1939 Oregon: no conference tournament 1940 Indiana: no conference tournament 1941 Wisconsin: no conference tournament 1942 Stanford: The Pacific Coast Conference was split into two division and the division winners played a best of three championship, which Stanford won, 2-1 over Oregon State. 1943 Wyoming: no conference tournament 1944 Utah: no conference tournament 1945 Oklahoma A&M (State): no conference tournament 1946 Oklahoma A&M (State): no conference tournament 1947 Holy Cross: no conference tournament 1948 Kentucky: won SEC tournament 1949 Kentucky: won SEC tournament 1950 CCNY: no conference tournament 1951 Kentucky: lost in finals of SEC tournament 1952 Kansas: no conference tournament 1953 Indiana: no conference tournament 1954 LaSalle: no conference tournament 1955 San Francisco: no conference tournament 1956 San Francisco: no conference tournament 1957 North Carolina: won ACC tournament 1958 Kentucky: no conference tournament (It had been suspended in the wake of the point shaving scandals: it wasn’t started up again until 1979.) 1959 California: no conference tournament 1960 Ohio State: no conference tournament 1961 Cincinnati: no conference tournament 1962 Cincinnati: no conference tournament 1963 Loyola (Chicago): no conference tournament 1964 UCLA: no conference tournament 1965 UCLA: no conference tournament 1966 Texas Western (UTEP): no conference tournament 1967 UCLA: no conference tournament 1968 UCLA: no conference tournament 1969 UCLA: no conference tournament 1970 UCLA: no conference tournament 1971 UCLA: no conference tournament 1972 UCLA: no conference tournament 1973 UCLA: no conference tournament 1974 North Carolina State: won the ACC Tournament 1975 UCLA: no conference tournament 1976 Indiana: no conference tournament 1977 Marquette: no conference tournament 1978 Kentucky: no conference tournament 1979 Michigan State: no conference tournament 1980 Louisville: won the Metro Tournament 1981 Indiana: no conference tournament 1982 North Carolina: won the ACC Tournament 1983 North Carolina State: won the ACC Tournament 1984 Georgetown: won the Big East Tournament 1985 Villanova: lost in BET semi-finals 1986 Louisville: won the Metro Tournament 1987 Indiana: no conference tournament 1988 Kansas: lost to Kansas State in Big 8 semi-finals 1989 Michigan: no conference tournament 1990 UNLV: won Big West Tournament 1991 Duke: lost in ACC final 1992 Duke: won ACC Tournament 1993 North Carolina: lost in ACC final 1994 Arkansas: lost in SEC semis 1995 UCLA: no conference tournament 1996 Kentucky: lost in SEC finals 1997 Arizona: no conference tournament 1998 Kentucky: won SEC Tournament 1999 Connecticut: won BET tournament 2000 Michigan State: won Big Ten Tournament 2001 Duke: won ACC Tournament 2002 Maryland: lost in ACC semis 2003 Syracuse: lost in Big East semis 2004 Connecticut: won Big East Tournament 2005 North Carolina: lost in ACC semis 2006 Florida: won SEC Tournament 2007 Florida: won SEC Tournament 2008 Kansas: won Big 12 Tournament 2009 North Carolina: lost in ACC semis 2010 Duke: won ACC Tournament 2011 Connecticut: won Big East Tournament Summary: If you include Stanford’s conference playoff win in 1942, 9which was 3 games), National champions have participated in 33 conference tournaments and won 22 of them- exactly two thirds. So losing the conference tournament doesn’t give you any advantages in winning the national title. The best teams tend to do both- because they are the best teams. Conference tournaments are neither an impediment to winning the national championship nor a stepping stone to it. They are simply another tournament- something else to win. [/QUOTE]

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