Winning the NIT

In college basketball (in the US), the team that wins the NIT (National Invitation Tournement) can legitmately call themselves the 65-th best team in the nation.

My alma mater, UCLA, won in 1985. Yay!

A list of the 65-th best teams in men's college basketball is:

• 2000 Wake Forest
• 1999 California
• 1998 Minnesota
• 1997 Michigan
• 1996 Nebraska
• 1995 Virginia Tech
• 1994 Villanova
• 1993 Minnesota
• 1992 Virginia
• 1991 Stanford
• 1990 Vanderbilt
• 1989 St. John's
• 1988 Connecticut
• 1987 Southern Miss.
• 1986 Ohio State
• 1985 UCLA

(Before 1985, the NCAA tournement had less than a 64-team field, so the previous NIT winners were better than the 65-th best team in the nation.)

For future reference, the other past NIT champions are:

• 1984 Michigan
• 1983 Fresno State
• 1982 Bradley
• 1981 Tulsa
• 1980 Virginia
• 1979 Indiana
• 1978 Texas
• 1977 St. Bonaventure
• 1976 Kentucky
• 1975 Princeton
• 1974 Purdue
• 1973 Virginia Tech
• 1972 Maryland
• 1971 North Carolina
• 1970 Marquette
• 1969 Temple
• 1968 Dayton
• 1967 Southern Illinois
• 1966 Brigham Young
• 1965 St. John's
• 1964 Bradley
• 1963 Providence
• 1962 Dayton
• 1961 Providence
• 1960 Bradley
• 1959 St. John's
• 1958 Xavier
• 1957 Bradley
• 1956 Louisville
• 1955 Duquesne
• 1954 Holy Cross
• 1953 Seton Hall
• 1952 La Salle
• 1951 Brigham Young
• 1950 CCNY
• 1949 San Francisco
• 1948 St. Louis
• 1947 Utah
• 1946 Kentucky
• 1945 DePaul
• 1944 St. John's
• 1943 St. John's
• 1942 West Virginia
• 1941 Long Island Univ.
• 1940 Colorado
• 1939 Long Island Univ.
• 1938 Temple

It was only in the '50s that the NCAA tournament became dominant, with the NIT becoming the secondary tournament of teams not good enough to make it to the NCAAs.

Teams were actually allowed to play in both the NCAA and NIT tournaments in the early years, as they were not concurrent. This allowed CCNY (City College of New York) to become the only team in history to win both tournaments in the same year in 1950.

The game that changed all this was the ACC tournament championship game on 9 March 1974. In what many from the area still call "the greatest game ever played", N.C. State beat Maryland 103-100 in overtime at the Greensboro Coliseum for the right to advance to the NCAA tournament. (As the story has it, legendary Maryland coach Lefty Driesell boarded the N.C. State team bus after the game and told the players, "I'm just as proud of you as I would be of my own kids. Now all I want you boys to do is go out there and win the national championship.")

N.C. State did go on to win the NCAA championship that year. Maryland, on the other hand, was so heartbroken by their loss that they declined the NIT invitation, though they were easily one of the top three or four teams in the nation (finishing #4 in the final AP poll). The NCAA field expanded in 1975 to 32 teams, allowing extra teams from power conferences like the ACC to advance, and has since grown larger: first to 48, then 64, and now 65 teams.