Sweet 16 Wouldn’t Taste Right Without ACC, Tar Heels, Devils – And What Might Final Four Bring?
By David Glenn
Here are five ACC and/or UNC-related fun facts heading into the Sweet 16/Elite Eight extended weekend of the 2022 NCAA Tournament:
(and, if you’re interested, click here for a chart outlining ACC appearances in the NCAA tournament since 1980!)
- Since the elimination of NCAA Tournament bids-per-conference restrictions in the 1970s, every Sweet 16 has included at least one ACC team, and most have included several.
Lately, ACC teams have been winning the national championship literally half the time. That’s a stunning accomplishment.
There are 32 conferences in Division I men’s basketball, yet over the last 12 years, for example, the count reads: Current ACC Members-6, The Other 31 Leagues Combined-6. (This counts Louisville’s title in 2013, one year before the Cardinals’ official ACC entry.)
Thanks to Duke (2010, 2015), Louisville (2013), North Carolina (2009, 2017) and Virginia (2019), “current ACC members” have won two of the last four NCAA championships, three of the last six, four of the last eight, and six of the last 12. Again, that’s literally half the time.
Even when you stretch the timetable, the numbers remain amazing. Going all the way back to 1980, for example, current ACC members have won 16 of 41 NCAA titles; that almost 40%, from a single league’s current membership, over more than four decades. As legendary broadcaster Dick Vitale might say, that’s awesome, baby, with a capital “A.”
The backdrop to the ACC’s cut-down-the-nets success includes consistency and variety leading up to the Final Four. (Please see the accompanying Sweet 16 chart, which includes only teams that were ACC members at the time.) All 15 current ACC members, for example, have represented the league in the Sweet 16, even though six of those schools were added only within the last two decades.
The ACC’s postseason consistency is reflected in the chart, too. Since the elimination of NCAA Tournament bids-per-conference restrictions in the 1970s, there has NEVER been a Sweet 16 held without at least one ACC member as a part of it. Most have included several ACC teams.
- After its uncommonly poor regular season, the ACC managed to hit its long-time average of three Sweet 16 participants, with Duke, Miami and UNC representing the league this year.
The ACC’s high-water mark in Sweet 16 representation came in 2016. In just its third season with 15 members, the league gobbled up six of those 16 spots by itself, with Duke, Miami, UNC, Notre Dame, Syracuse and Virginia all still standing. Although the Tar Heels and the Orange both advanced to the Final Four, the league’s stunning depth didn’t translate into another title, as Villanova edged the Heels with a buzzer-beater in the championship game.
At the other end of the spectrum, since the elimination of NCAA Tournament bids-per-conference restrictions in the 1970s, there have been only five years when the ACC had only one representative in the Sweet 16: 2007 (UNC), 2008 (UNC), 2010 (Duke), 2014 (Virginia) and 2017 (UNC). The 2010 Blue Devils and 2017 Tar Heels, of course, squashed any “ACC is down” talk during March Madness in those years by going on to win the NCAA title.
Over these last four decades or so, the ACC’s average number of Sweet 16 participants has been roughly three per year, so Duke, Miami and UNC managed to keep that tradition going.
- From 1980-2022, a stretch of 42 NCAA Tournaments, the Sweet 16 included some combination of Carolina and/or Duke 39 times, and both schools made it 16 times.
Duke and UNC clearly have played the starring roles in making the state of North Carolina the unofficial Center of the College Basketball Universe over the last four decades.
The starting point for that argument is, as usual, national championships. During the “open era” of the NCAA Tournament, meaning starting in 1980, Duke and UNC (with five each) have the most NCAA titles. Only four other programs are even close in that stretch.
It’s about more than titles, though. The consistency of both programs has been off the charts, too. Over the 42 NCAA Tournaments held in the open era, for example, there have been only three years in which the Sweet 16 didn’t include Carolina, Duke or both: 1996, 2014 and 2021.
The presence of both the Tar Heels and the Blue Devils in this year’s Sweet 16 isn’t at all unusual. In fact, during the seven-year stretch from 1986-92, both teams made the Sweet 16 EVERY year. Over the last 36 NCAA Tournaments, the Duke-Carolina Sweet 16 double has happened 16 times.
- Miami and UNC recently became the 12th and 13th ACC teams to reach the Sweet 16 while seeded eighth or lower. Only two of the previous 11 reached the Final Four.
Bill Guthridge and Jim Boeheim. That’s the list. They are the only head coaches, at least for now, who have taken an ACC team seeded #8 or lower all the way to the Final Four.
Guthridge took #8 seed UNC to the national semifinals in 2000. The Tar Heels, who entered the NCAA Tournament with an 18-13 record, knocked off three nationally ranked opponents, including #1 seed Stanford in the second round, before falling to Florida at the Final Four.
Boeheim took #10 seed Syracuse to the national semifinals in 2016. The Orange, who entered the NCAA Tournament with a 19-13 record after a ninth-place tie in the ACC standings, upset #1 seed Virginia in the Elite Eight, then lost to UNC at the Final Four.
Jim Larranaga of #10 seed Miami and Hubert Davis of #8 seed UNC are trying to add their names to that impressive list this week.
Larranaga, 72, previously authored one of the best underdog runs in NCAA Tournament history. In 2006, he led #11 seed George Mason to the Final Four. To this day, that remains the lowest seed ever to reach the national semifinals, a feat matched by only LSU (1986), VCU (2011), Loyola-Chicago (2018) and UCLA (2021).
Davis, 51, is just getting started with this March Madness stuff, at least as a head coach. He was a UNC sophomore in 1990, when Dean Smith took a #8 seed, the lowest-seeded team of his entire career, on a surprising run to the Sweet 16. As a player, Davis participated in four consecutive NCAA Tournaments, then four straight NBA Playoffs to begin his pro career.
Regardless of what happens next, Davis already has made the right kind of history. UNC’s second-round win over #1 seed Baylor, for example, marked the first time in Carolina’s illustrious history that it had eliminated the defending national champion in the NCAA Tournament. Also, while UNC’s victory over the Bears was the Tar Heels’ ninth all-time over a #1 seed, it was only the third time it happened with the Heels as a #8 seed (meaning a heavy underdog), joining Smith’s 1990 team (#1 Oklahoma) and Guthridge’s 2000 squad (#1 Stanford).
- Despite 257 head-to-head contests (over 102 years) in what ranks among the most famous rivalries in American sports, Duke and UNC have never met in the NCAA Tournament, but …
If Duke and UNC both go 2-0 this week (no easy task), they will face each other at the Final Four in New Orleans. Yes, they’re on the same side of the bracket this year.
The #2 seed Blue Devils would have to beat #3 Texas Tech on Thursday, then either #1 seed Gonzaga or #4 seed Arkansas on Saturday, to win the West Regional. The #8 seed Tar Heels would have to beat #4 seed UCLA on Friday, then either #3 seed Purdue or #15 seed Saint Peter’s on Sunday, to win the East Regional.
Approximately 31 years ago, this unthinkable Final Four matchup almost happened, and it would have been the be-all, end-all in the history of Duke-Carolina, because it would have come (since they were on opposite sides of the bracket that year) with the NCAA title on the line!
Alas, UNC lost its 1991 national semifinal matchup against Kansas, then coached by Roy Williams. Soon after, Duke shocked the world by beating previously undefeated and top-ranked UNLV. Two days later, the Blue Devils edged the Jayhawks for their first NCAA championship.
According to various analytics and probability estimates, the chance of the world getting a Duke-Carolina national semifinal this year is only about 3%. Or, as Jim Carrey/Lloyd Christmas once said famously in the “Dumb and Dumber” movie, “so you’re telling me there’s a chance!”
For now, at least, the only example (in a 102-year-old rivalry) of Duke and UNC meeting in a national postseason tournament came in 1971. In the National Invitation Tournament semifinals, held at Madison Square Garden in New York City, the Tar Heels beat the Blue Devils 73-67. Carolina then defeated Georgia Tech for the NIT championship.
Next time: More March Madness, of course!
David Glenn (DavidGlennShow.com, @DavidGlennShow) is an award-winning author, broadcaster, editor, entrepreneur, publisher, speaker, writer and university lecturer (now at UNC Wilmington) who has covered sports in North Carolina since 1987.
The founding editor and long-time owner of the ACC Sports Journal and ACCSports.com, he also has contributed to the Durham Herald-Sun, ESPN Radio, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Raycom Sports, SiriusXM and most recently The Athletic. From 1999-2020, he also hosted the David Glenn Show, which became the largest sports radio program in the history of the Carolinas, syndicated in more than 300 North Carolina cities and towns, plus parts of South Carolina and Virginia.
