Kentucky’s recently completed 38–2 romp to the NCAA title was one of the more impressive runs in NCAA history.
Not every year does the perceived favorite make it through all six rounds of the Cinderella-laden tournament unscathed. Whether from unexpected injuries, a bad shooting game, or just being unable to deal with high-expectations, the best team is not always crowned champion come April.
Here are the 10 most dominating teams, since the tournament expanded to 64 teams in 1985 that crowned their seasons with a title at the end:
10. 2008 Kansas: 37–3 record, AP No. 1-ranked for: 0 weeks, star players: Brandon Rush, Mario Chalmers—The 2008 NCAA Tournament was the first time since the field expanded in 1985 that all four No. 1 seeds reached the Final Four and Kansas, with six future draft picks (three first-round, three second-round picks) came away with the title. Though it took a miracle shot from Chalmers and some timely missed free throws by Memphis in the title game, Kansas’s 37 wins were the most ever by a champion until Kentucky’s 38 this past season, giving them a very slight edge over North Carolina’s 1993 team that went 34–4.
9. UCLA 1995: 31-2 record, AP No. 1-ranked for: 3 weeks, star players: Ed O‘Bannon, Charles O’Bannon, Tyus Edney—The Bruins won their final 19 games of the ‘95 season and though it took a last-second Tyus Edney shot to get past Missouri in the second round, UCLA won both of its Final Four games by double-figures. Though talent-wise the Bruins match up well with KU’s ’08 squad, UCLA went into the tournament with the bulls-eye on their backs, having been the No. 1 ranked team in the land the final three weeks of the season.
8. Connecticut 1999: 34-2 record, AP No. 1-ranked for: 10 weeks, star players: Richard Hamilton, Khalid El-Amin—Though the Huskies’ resume, on the surface, could go higher on this list this was before Calhoun had delivered a title and Duke that went 37–2 that season and spent the final eight weeks as No. 1, was the slightly more feared team that year. Connecticut eventually took down the favored Blue Devils in the title game though.
7. Duke 2001: 35-4 record, AP No. 1-ranked for: 5 weeks, star players: Shane Battier, Carlos Boozer, Jay Williams, Mike Dunleavy—Coach Krzyzewsk‘’s third title-winning team had three of its four losses by two points or less and beat conference-rival Maryland three times in four tries—including a 95–84 win in the Final Four. Had it not been for Jay Williams’s injury, the core four players of this team (listed above) would still be in the NBA today. The Blue Devils’ run here gets the edge over UConn’s in ’99 due to their domination in the NCAA Tournament as all six wins were by 10 points or more.
6. Kentucky 1996: 34-2 record, AP No. 1-ranked for: 5 weeks, star players: Antoine Walker, Tony Delk, Ron Mercer, Derek Anderson, Nazr Mohammed, Walter McCarty—This Kentucky team was the pinnacle of Rick Pitino’s reclamation project, as the Wildcats ran the tables in the SEC (16-0) and won their first four NCAA Tournament games by a whopping 28.3 points per contest before downing UMass and Syracuse in the Final Four. Six first-round draft picks came from this squad and the team returned to the title game each of the next two seasons. Kentucky’s better record puts them just ahead of Duke’s ‘01 team.
5. Florida 2007: 35-5...
5. Florida 2007: 35-5 record, AP No.1-ranked for: 8 weeks, star players: Joakim Noah, Al Horford, Corey Brewer—The 2006 defending-champion Gators all decided to postpone their NBA dreams for a year to have a shot at defending their title and it paid off. The preseason No. 1-ranked team in the country that year, Billy Donovan’s squad fought through high expectations and rebounded from a stretch at the end of the regular season where they lost three out of four contests to win the last 10 games of the season. Though only one of their tournament wins was by double-digits, no game finished closer than seven points.
4. North Carolina 2009: 34-4 record, AP No.1-ranked for: 9 weeks, star players: Tyler Hansbrough, Ty Lawson, Wayne Ellington—The Tar Heels, after losing to Kansas by 18 in the Final Four the year before returned nearly everyone from that team and the squad has produced four first-round picks so far, as then-freshman Tyler Zeller will await his NBA fate in this June’s draft. Though the Gators of ‘07 faced slightly more pressure Carolina was more dominant at the end, winning every tournament game by at least 12 points and impressively downing Michigan State (in Detroit) in the finals by 17 points in a game that was nearly out of hand by halftime.
3. UNLV 1990: 35-5 record, AP No. 1-ranked for: 1 week, star players: Larry Johnson, Stacey Augmon, Greg Anthony—Though UNLV spent just one week at the top of the polls, it was the preseason one that recognized its talent, notably future NBA top-draft-pick Larry Johnson. And despite North Carolina’s better record in 2009, the Running Rebels get the nod with their incredible 103–73 shellacking of Duke in the title game.
2. Kentucky 2012: 38-2 record, AP No. 1-ranked for: 10 weeks, star players: Anthony Davis, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Terrence Jones—The Wildcats, with Davis and Kidd-Gilchrist possibly being the first two picks in the upcoming draft, had slightly more star power than UNLV in ‘90. They also bore the lion’s share of pressure, being the “team to beat” all season long. Though they didn’t win the title game by 30 points they never trailed in the second half of either Final Four game and won each of their first four games by double-digits.
1. Duke 1992: 34-2 record, AP No. 1-ranked for: 18 weeks (entire season), star players: Christian Laettner, Bobby Hurley, Grant Hill—Coach K'' second championship team gets the easy nod here over all the others as the defending champions that returned all three stars, were aiming for not only their fifth straight Final Four appearance but their third straight title game attempt. Even Laettner’s uneven performance in the Final Four after his shot heard around the world against Kentucky in the Elite Eight was unable to slow down the Blue Devils as they downed Michigan 71—51 for the title.
