Well, when you say haven't matched that success  ( back to back NCAA Titles in the 50s with Bill Russell) that's a bit of an understatement.... they've played  zero NCAA tourney appearances this century, not 1 trip. 

They haven't just not  played in an NCAA tourney game this century, they've basically had no post-season of any kind, 1 NIT in the last 15 years, a 1st round loss. This is a perennial for decades now mediocre WCC team, and they were picked 5th this year in the as always top heavy WCC.  It would be great for Gonzaga if some other program besides ST Marys or BYU rose up and maybe the Dons will at long last.

UVA came in a projected #1 seed, top 4 team, this is a monster upset.

Either way, shades of as in two huge upsets, both at the hands of two excellent UVA teams by enormous underdogs which is what the Dons were in this game.  Kudos To The Dons!!



 

Exactly Gwmayhem. Dude, I don't disagree with most of what you said - San Francisco isn't exactly a mid-major juggernaut by any means nowadays, but I was moreso getting at the fact that a middle of the pack team in a top 10 conference like the WCC is quite different from a team that's not Vermont in a conference that isn't even top 20. It can't be understated how great of a job Odom has done at UMBC, because honestly the program was irrelevant before he got there. The UMBC-UVA upset might go down as one of the biggest in college basketball history, if not the biggest given the margin of victory for the Retrievers. If you were referring to the fact that UVA was involved in both the upsets, then I agree 100% and perhaps I read too much into it.

The discussion of why San Francisco hasn't had any postseason berths in the past 20+ years is an interesting one for sure. Obviously it's ludicrous to think the WCC would be better off without Gonzaga, but an argument could definitely be made that depth would be a lot better (and increase postseason berths). There would still be solid clubs like St. Mary's and BYU at the top. San Francisco, Santa Clara, Pepperdine, Pacific, San Diego, and Loyola Marymount could definitely be NIT quality most years (although the latter two are rebuilding this year). Perhaps Portland could get there as well if they moved on from Terry Porter (his own son who was one of their best players decided to transfer from the team this offseason! That's how you know things are getting bad there).

If there was ever a time for them to break the Gonzaga-St. Mary's-BYU top tier, it would be this year given the WCC is in a down year outside of Gonzaga. St. Mary's might dip a bit since they lost two really good players, both to the pros and BYU lost some long-tenured players to graduation. Gonzaga dominates most years anyway, but this year could be their most dominant yet.

Time will tell, but I do feel like UVA was ranked a bit too high in the preseason (not saying like outside of top 25 or anything, but certainly not top 5). They ran through one of the worst editions of the ACC in recent years despite having an offense that was comparable to our team for most of last year before our team ran out of gas a bit.