Despite becoming the second No. 11 seed to make it to the Final Four, George Mason still has two more games to win the national title before it can be put in the category with true Cinderellas such as the 1985 Villanova Wildcats or the 1997 Arizona Wildcats.
Making it to the Final Four is an impressive feat, but many teams have stumbled after capturing a berth in the Final Four. It takes a special kind of team, such as Villanova and Arizona, to reach the annals of college basketball history.
The ’85 Villanova team is the most popular upset-minded team to ever play in the tournament. Center Ed Pickney led the Wildcats to victories over two No. 2-seeds, North Carolina and Memphis State, before taking down the Goliath that was the No. 1-ranked Georgetown Hoyas.
Arizona was just as impressive led by freshman point guard Mike Bibby when the No. 4-seeded Wildcats defeated No. 3 seed Kansas, No. 2 seed North Carolina and No. 1 seed Kentucky to capture the ’97 crown.
The Patriots upset of No. 1-seeded Connecticut was quite a feat, but can’t be put up against Villanova’s upset of Patrick Ewing and the Hoyas. When Arizona upset Kentucky in the ’97 title game, Kentucky was in the midst of three consecutive championship game appearances with two national titles.
The Huskies are a good team, but they don’t have the talent that the ’85 Hoyas or ’97 Wildcats possessed when getting upset in the championship game.
George Mason’s run is impressive and is on a great run, but has a long way to go before it can be mentioned as the best ever.
Charles Gonzalez
3 comments:
I think it is awful that the USF paper has done nothing to include the news of our northern neighbor UF in the Final Four. After making the Final Four, the score alone was printed while article upon article of Cinderella G. Mason has been done. There are MANY former Gators at USF and Gator alumni who attend USF. I think it is rude to not include news of their victories when they are from our home state. In addition, you ignore a great many of your readers and disrespect an athletic program that USF could learn A LOT from.
Go back to UF and read about UF athletics, we're at USF. Just like mike said, USF has alumni from all over the place just like any other school that has a graduate program. What a pathetic comment.
GO BULLS!!!!!
right on mike, I absolutely agree and it would be an outrage to see UF on the front page or in the oracle at all unless USF has beaten them. Were trying to create our own pride here.
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