It is almost that time of the year. March Madness is just around the corner with Selection Sunday coming up on the 17th, but for almost every fan right now it feels like it has already started. With conference tournaments happening now, teams are trying to punch their guaranteed ticket to the tournament. For most big basketball schools, winning their conference would just be bragging rights because they’ll most likely already have a good chance to make it. But for the smaller schools, this might be their only chance to keep their season alive (because no one counts the NIT).
Now, what is the NCAA National Basketball Championship (March Madness)? This a tournament of 64 teams who compete vs. opponents based on the seeds they’ve been given. The way teams receive their seeds is based on the team’s performance in the regular season. Now that we have all 64 teams, they now play one single game of basketball vs their opponents. Whatever team wins will move on to the next round of play. This streak continues for the next seven rounds until we have our final big game. The winner of this game will be crowned the National Basketball Champions of that year.
But if you're a non-basketball fan, you’re probably wondering why everyone is obsessed over March Madness so much. Well, the answer is really in the title itself: the word Madness. You can never expect what will happen in the tournament, no matter how confident a team can be. First, what is an upset? According to an official NCAA article, an upset in March Madness is a team seeded 5 spots worse than the team they beat, so a pretty big gap. The average is 8.5 upsets per year, which is a ridiculous amount if you think about it since there are only 64 teams.
Now even though this tournament is fun to watch due to upsets, there are just some teams that just can’t stop winning the whole tournament multiple times. Here are the top 5 teams with the most wins. In 5th place are the Kansas Jayhawks who recently won their 5th ring in 2022. Next, we have a three-way tie for 4th, with each team winning four championships. This group consists of the Duke Blue Devils, Indiana Hoosiers, and the UConn Huskies. Now we jump up to 3rd with the North Carolina Tar Heels holding that spot. Next, we have reached the top 2 teams of all time. Holding the second-place spot is my favorite team, the Kentucky Wildcats who have a total of 8 championship wins. But who holds the number one spot? The number one spot with a total of 11 championships is held by the California blue and gold UCLA Bruins, and with a lead of three more wins than Kentucky, the race for 1st will most likely stay in the hands of the Bruins for quite a while.
So grab yourself a bucket of popcorn, find a nice cozy place with an 85-inch TV, and enjoy the Madness that materializes from March as the National Basketball Championship kicks off.