By Woodrow Carroll
For collegiate basketball fans, the regular season has come to an end. Now, it’s on to tournament time. A period that takes a hold of the sporting public in a way that neither the World Series or the Super Bowl can match at times.
College basketball crowned its first NCAA Men’s Champion in 1939 with Oregon claiming the title. At the time the NIT (National Invitational Tournament) was already underway- the NIT started in 1938, and the two tournaments vied for recognition for many years.
In time, what the NCAA did was expand the tournaments size to add more and more teams. The better teams were going to the NCAA Men’s Tournament and there was little the NIT could do about it. The NCAA Tournament, and we are talking about the men’s tournament although the women’s tournament has certainly entered the public’s sporting conscious in recent years. The NIT still exists! But, it has become a secondary tournament in large part.
It was not until the 1956 men’s tournament before an undefeated team emerged. The University of San Francisco Dons, with future NBA star Bill Russell at center, finished the 1955-1956 season undefeated with a final record of 29-0.
San Francisco’s undefeated run seemed to set off a string of undefeated teams winning the crown.
In 1957 North Carolina went unblemished. Then came UCLA, 1964, 1967, 1972, and 1973, which ran the table, sans a defeat. Lastly, Indiana in 1976 finished with a hyphen zero record.
Ohio State’s 1960-1961 squad just missed joining that illustrious group of undefeated National Champions.
The Ohio State Buckeyes captured the men’s NCAA crown in 1960 with a 75-55 victory over defending champion California. The title game was played at the Cow Palace in San Francisco. The title game saw the Buckeyes up 37-19 at half and from there, the Buckeyes cruised to victory.
With four starters back from the championship team, the Buckeyes were the team to beat for the 1961 crown. And Ohio State came close!
Ohio State ended the regular season undefeated. The final stop in the championship run was a meeting with state rival, Cincinnati.
The appearance of the Cincinnati Bearcats in the 1961 title game came as a bit of a surprise. The three previous seasons, with the legendary Oscar Roberson in the Cincy lineup, found the Bearcats coming up short.
Not much was expected out of Cincy for the 1960-61 season. However, after a slow start to the campaign the Bearcats suffered a 72-53 loss at Bradley just before Christmas, and the team took off. Turned out the defeat suffered in Peoria was to be the final setback of the season for the Bearcats.
The 1961 NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship game was played in Kansas City. If you were looking for a good omen, you could point out that four years earlier undefeated North Carolina had knocked off Kansas and Wilt Chamberlain, 54-53, in triple overtime in the same arena. (North Carolina had to go three overtimes in its semifinal victory over Michigan State, also.)
In that 1961 championship game, the two teams were close all the way. The Buckeyes were up 39-38 at the break with the contest knotted 61-all at the end of regulation. However, thanks to a 9-4 overtime run, the Bearcats laid claim to the championship trophy, 70-65.
The following season it was Ohio State and Cincinnati again meeting for the crown. Only this time there was no need for overtime with Cincinnati the 71-59 victor.
If you are looking for an interesting story line, we might point out that Bob Knight, who coached Indiana’s undefeated 1975-1976 Hoosiers to the NCAA crown, was a part of Ohio State’s three title appearances in 1960-1962.