{"id":36643,"date":"2022-03-09T13:53:52","date_gmt":"2022-03-09T13:53:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/?p=36643"},"modified":"2024-06-01T09:50:42","modified_gmt":"2024-06-01T08:50:42","slug":"five-biggest-march-madness-upsets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/sports\/basketball\/five-biggest-march-madness-upsets\/","title":{"rendered":"Five Biggest March Madness Upsets"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It&#8217;s showtime in college basketball, or March Madness, as the NCAA&#8217;s championships have been known since the early 1980s. The finals pre-date the term \u2013 the first was played in 1939 \u2013 and over such a long and illustrious life, naturally there have been plenty of March Madness upsets. Here are five of the best.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">UMBC Retrievers 74 Virginia Cavaliers 54 \u2013 March 16, 2018<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Going into the 2018 tournament the record of No.16 seeds versus No.1 seeds since the competition&#8217;s expansion in 1985 read 0-135. The big boys never lost \u2013 simple as!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But on March 16 that year, that stat became 1-135 when UMBC stunned Virginia in what is, by any measure, the biggest shock of the lot. And they did it in style.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Cavaliers from UVA had gone 17-1 through their Atlantic campaign and weren&#8217;t just top seeds in the south, they were also top seeds overall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">UMBC&#8217;s Retrievers, pretty much written off as soon as the bracket was revealed, ignored the script and produced the ultimate upset by an incredible 74-54 scoreline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-embed-handler wp-block-embed-embed-handler wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"UMBC vs. Virginia: Retrievers become first 16-seed to knock off a No. 1\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/pIoVgJTOx5Y?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders 90 Michigan State Spartans 81 \u2013 March 19, 2016<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Overlooked for top seeding in the MidWest, despite a conference-high 29 wins, the Spartans paid a heavy price for that anomaly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It meant a showdown with the dangerous 15th seeds, the Blue Raiders, though it was still widely assumed Michigan State would prevail having entered the finals on a 14-0 streak.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But it was the Blue Raiders who flew out of the traps, taking a 15-2 lead early on, and they were never headed en route to a famous win.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Florida Gulf Coast Eagles 78 Georgetown Hoyas 68 \u2013 March 22, 2013<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">National champs? That was the millstone round the Hoyas&#8217; necks as they took on flyweights from Fort Myers, Florida who were in Philadelphia to have fun \u2013 oh, and cause one of the biggest shocks of all time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Georgetown were all textbook and slick; the Eagles were all about threes, alley-oops and fast breaks, a style which earned them the nickname &#8220;Dunk City&#8221;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-embed-handler wp-block-embed-embed-handler wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"FGCU Dunk City: Every Florida Gulf Coast dunk from 2013 March Madness\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/vMJqsx-9y5o?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Valparaiso Crusaders 70 University of Mississippi Rebels 69 \u2013 March 13, 1998<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The game that has gone down in NCAA folklore as &#8220;The Shot&#8221;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ole Miss, fourth seeds in the Midwest, were leading 69-67 with just three seconds left and were off to the free throw line to seal the deal over the 13th seed Crusaders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But, under serious pressure, Ansu Sesay managed to miss twice from the line, Valparaiso won the rebound and Bryce Drew, who had missed a three-pointer seconds earlier, nailed one from 23 feet as the buzzer sounded as veteran CBS commentator Ted Robinson hailed &#8220;a miracle&#8221;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Hampton Pirates 58 Iowa State Cyclones 57 \u2013 March 15, 2001<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Another 2-v-15 match-up that went off-message.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Clones flicked a switch at the interval to turn a four-point deficit into an 11-point lead with eight to play \u2013 then suddenly turned it off again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Pirates closed on a 14-2 winning run topped by Travis Williams winning basket with six seconds on the clock, Iowa State missed from close and cue some of the finest celebration scenes you&#8217;ll ever witness on YouTube.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s showtime in college basketball, or March Madness, as the NCAA&#8217;s championships have been known since the early 1980s. The finals pre-date the term \u2013 the first was played in 1939 \u2013 and over such a long and illustrious life, naturally there have been plenty of March Madness upsets. Here are five of the best. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":35,"featured_media":39465,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[203],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-basketball"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/35"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36643"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40418,"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36643\/revisions\/40418"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mansionbet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}