There is an ongoing debate of which program is the greatest in the history of college basketball. There are three clear front runners and each fan base promotes their case of being the best each year. Kentucky, UCLA and North Carolina hold almost all of the NCAA basketball team records. UCLA has the most titles with 11, and Kentucky holds the most wins with 1,965. North Carolina has produced more great professional players than any other school, including the greatest player in the history of the NBA, Michael Jordan. After analyzing each team’s historical resume, it is this man’s opinion that one team stands head and shoulders above the other two. The Kentucky Wildcats are the definition of prestige, and stand alone as the greatest program of all time.
Before we get started on these three teams, let’s go ahead and wipe out any suspicions that other teams, such as Indiana, Kansas, Duke, or Louisville have a case for being the top program. Indiana has won five championships, which is actually one more than North Carolina’s four. However, in terms of wins, they are barely in the top ten. Duke and Kansas have claimed three, while Louisville has two. Kansas and Duke stand three and four on the all time wins list, but both UK and UNC are one and two on that list, and have more titles. How can you really include them in the argument?
Let’s review the Bruins case. Several teams have actually won more games than UCLA, including St. Johns and Temple. UCLA compiled all of their titles except for one in an eleven year span. From 1964 to 1975, coach John Wooden and the Bruins clearly dominated college basketball. If you take away those seasons however, UCLA wouldn’t even be considered a top ten program. They would be on par with teams such as Holy Cross or La Salle in terms of titles. Obviously you can not just take away these years, nor should you, but most of UCLA’s success came at one time, under a couple groups of special players such as Lou Alcindor and Bill Walton, while other programs such as Kentucky and North Carolina have sustained their success over a much longer period of time. Though UCLA has reached the final four each of the last three seasons, they have claimed just one title in the last 33 years. They were a one decade wonder. The Bruin’s eleven championships is the most in the college basketball, which is why they do deserve to be in the argument for the top program, but one has to question the legitimacy of those titles. There has been continuous speculation over the years of how a member of Wooden’s staff may have bent the rules more so than anyone else in that era. It took the great John Wooden sixteen years to claim his first title, and then his teams exploded, capturing ten titles in the next twelve years. There is clearly something very odd about that. Despite barely being in the top 10 in terms of wins, I’ll give UCLA the nod for the third best program of all time.
North Carolina is the second most prestigious program in the nation. They have four titles that have each come in a different decade. The school has produced many great NBA players such as Michael Jordan and James Worthy. One could actually argue they have underachieved in terms of success with the caliber of players they have brought in over the years, but having the second most wins, and claiming more titles than all but three teams is not too bad. In the last few years, the Heels have become an absolute recruiting juggernaut. We’ll see if they can capitalize on this recruiting in the near future. Each of these top programs have had a great coach which has paved the road for future success, and Dean Smith, who captured two championships, was Carolina’s. The Tar Heels may actually be the most popular program, and many people around the country view them as the top program, but Kentucky’s historical resume would beg to differ.
The top program, Kentucky has several amazing stats to boast. Four different coaches have won titles at UK. This has not been done at any other school. This shows that the tradition of Kentucky’s program is bigger than the coach, and that its athletic directors have done a great job over the years of hiring coaches. Adolph Rupp, who paved the way for Kentucky’s success won four titles. He would be in the argument for greatest coach of all time. Joe B. Hall, Rick Pitino, and Tubby Smith each won one title for the cats as well. Though Kentucky may not have produced as many NBA legends as several of the other top programs, they have produced more great college players and teams. Surprisingly the Wildcats have actually produced more NCAA All-Americans than any other program. Greats such as Tony Delk may not have had the NBA careers of players such as Michael Jordan from UNC, but Delk was arguably a better college player. Many of you may have never even heard of Delk before! Michael Jordan was only able to claim one title at UNC. He just didn’t dominate in college the way he did for the Chicago Bulls. Some players blossom at a later age than others. During their college years, however, Kentucky players and teams have been better, more consistently than any other program. The University of Kentucky has won more titles than any team except for UCLA, and won more games and NCAA tournament games than any other program. The Cats also have the greatest winning percentage of any team. They have been the best division one program of all time, and there isn’t that much of an argument.
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Thank you for the wonderful article. Yes, Kentucky is the best program of all time. With Billy Gillispie, it is an odds on favorite to keep the title for many years.
How can you just discount UCLA’s titles? You’re making quite an assumption by suggesting they were illegally obtained. That has never been proven and UCLA is innocent until proven otherwise.
Wooden is the finest coach of all time. That, combined with their great players and number of championships makes them the greatest basketball program of all time.
One of UCLA’s assistants, Gilbert, was sanctioned for illegally recruiting, but the NCAA never took away their titles. The information came out years later. The NCAA does not want to make a big deal out of something and make college basketball look like a fraud. Wooden was clearly a great coach, and he may or may not have known about Gilbert’s tactics of pretty much paying their players. I was not there, but I can speculate on how it takes Wooden 16 years to win a title, and then he goes off and gets 10 out of the next 12. They had tons All Americans sitting the bench happy as could be which isn’t realistic, unless they were being “specially” treated. I did not discount those titles, and even with them Kentucky has the best resume, because they win games more.
I couldn’t agree more! It says a lot when a program can produce wins over such a great period of time.
sure uk has the most wins of all time, they played in one of the shittiest conferences up until recently when the sec finally became competitive in basketball. football is all the sec has ever been good at and thats why UK has ruled the shitty conference in bball.
This is the worst article i have ever read … Kentucky is the scum of basketball and you can’t just discredit UCLA’s wins just because of a bullshit rumor. Kentucky is a joke in the world of sports and their coach Billy Gillispie is the punch line. Just be glad that by some lucky streak Kentucky made it to the tournament this year ..it’s to bad they didn’t even show up to play
You all can talk our your stuff about college basketball, but I know the best team over the long haul and it has not been UCLA or UNC. If Dean Smith had won half of the chapionships his team appeared in the NCAA tournament I would think he’s a genius. He didn’t so you know what I think, if you got the players you win, and he had them and didn’t win a lot. Must have been a coaching problem somewhere based on the number of trips to the NCAA. Argue that if you can, I know the numbers. Wooden may possibly be the best coach of all time and I liked his defense and offense and I have coached, but why did it take him 16 years to win? There will always be discussions about that sort of thing. It was obviously something the NCAA didn’t want to put out like an earlier poster said, to protect the game, but they should have been put on probabtion. They knew if they did that then the game would be tarnished and more turmoil, etc. I think there are a lotta great college teams out there today as evidenced by the final four results. As for “uksucks” I think the SEC has proven their worthiness in the last several years, Fla won two, etc. So you are full of it!
Take your West Coast games and who won it all this year>? UCLA got more calls and breaks during the last several games than any team in history and bowed out to a great Memphis team that could have won it all if they had hit free throws. They didn’t and they didn’t win. UCLA had a darn good team regardless of the help from whistles the last few games and even into the tournament, but after awhile, it will catch up with you! You need to stay out West cause when you talk about the SEC we get serious! GO BIG BLUE, VOLS, GATORS AND TIGERS TOO!
UKsucks: Kentucky has the best winning % and most wins in the NCAA tournament out of any team, and almost all of those games are against out of conference teams. Your whole argument was just discredited.
Dukerunsshit: Do me a favor. Take your NCAA championships. Add them to North Carolina’s titles. You get Kentucky. Enough said. As for the UCLA rumor, they were sanctioned years later, so it is not just a rumor. And Duke really showed up for this years tournament!.. signed Belmont and WVU
uksucks: In the last 10 years, the SEC and the ACC have the same amount of national titles(3).
Dukerunsshit pretty much clarified what every other college basketball fan in the world already knew, and that was that you, and every other Duke fan knows absolutely nothing when it comes to college basketball. Kentucky is at the top of tournament wins, percentage, appearances and they have done that from the begining. Sustained success, my friend. Your Dukies and UNC have played just as long as Kentucky has and can’t match them in any statistical category. In fact, both ACC powers have played more games than Kentucky, yet they have a ton of more loses. So, shut up and watch ESPN for more of rhetorical nonesense.
Duke. Yeah, they showed up for the tourney amid a bunch of hype. Same sh*t, different year. Tough when you’re not getting the ridiculous calls, isn’t it? How many burger boys does the rat king have, btw?
This ranking of the college basketball elite is 100% correct from a statistical point of view. Any attempts to discredit it is at the expense of your intelligence.
Great Post. Kentucky seems to hold all of the most significant records that really indicate staying power vs. being a “flash in the pan.” I have to agree with you on this one.
man yall need to quit hating on duke so much.If duke fans knew nothing about basketball then how come they go to a top 5 school in the country.fucking dumbasses.Little stat for ya duke has been a 1 seed in the tournament 10 of the past 16 years.Not even UCLA did that on their championships run.3 championships and definately the most feared program in the game, i’d throw duke in that talk.Duke doesn’t compare just because they weren’t good til coach K got there.
P.S. Just because Duke has had 2 below excellent season doesn’t give anybody the right to bash the program.You all know they are the most feared team in the game and they are only getting hated on because this is the first chance youve had to bash them in what 20 years.Its like when the yankees started off bad a few years ago and everybody questioned if they still had the talent.I believe the yankees are still a feared team in baseball just like Duke is in basketball.If you didn;t fear Duke, you wouldnt talk so badly about them so lets start writing comments with our brains and not our favorite haterade flavor bitches.
Stumbled in here a little late but I think it should be noted: Gilbert was never an assistant. He was a booster who alledgedly helped out players (without any knowledge or consent by the university). The only sanction ( if you want to call it a sanction) was that Gilbert was banned from communicating with players based on suspicion. Of course we can always suspect as to why it is that certain programs such as Duke or N.C. or Kentucky or Kansas always attract top talent through the years. No team is above reproach as to player special treatment, they all recieve it in some form. So take that out of the equation. Maybe you should add that the Wooden era was a 3 year era (freshmen were ineligible) yet U.C.L.A. maintained a level that far surpasses
any accomplishment ever achieved before or since.
10 straight titles, 7 in a row. 69 wins in a row, only to be eclipsed by 88 in row by the same school but a completely different group of people.
Lets match NBA greats school for school (U.C.L.A. by far) trough the years when people actuslly cared about basketball (which, not coincidently, began with the Bruin rise). U.C.L.A. s greatness is such that
their most classic games are ones which they actually and so rarely lost.
As for post Wooden they are no less successful than any of the others. Final Fours, NCAA title etc. They are simply the greatest because they put the game on the map period. No one gave a shit before the rise of the Bruins. They put the bread on everyone’s table.
It’s time to set a few things straight.. First of all, Kansas can absolutely make a case for this spot. They had 5 National Championships for the record, not your indicated 3. Everyone forgets about the back to back ones in 1922 and 1923 although they were “National Championships” before its was called the “NCAA National Championship”. I realize it was a long time ago, but they still need to be accounted for. But here are some other things that you forgot about Kansas basketball:
1. The INVENTOR of the game, Dr. James Naismith, coached here…no one else can say that. Surprisingly, he was the only coach to have a losing record for KU even though it was his game.
2. Kansas has more conference titles than any other team in the country (51)..especially more than the talentless SEC
3. Kansas is the birthplace of UNC basketball. Dean Smith played for us, and without him North Carolina would not be on the basketball map. He is the sole reason they are where they are today. Dean Smith is also the reason Roy left KU to replace another ex-KU coach in Matt Dougherty.
4. The same can be said for Adolph Rupp. He played on Kansas’ team under coach Forrest “Phog” Allen. He was also born in Halstead, KS.. Rupp had the same affect on Kentucky basketball that Smith had. Without his success, you would be another mediocre SEC team like you are now.
5. While you say you lead in all time wins, it appears that argument will not hold for another couple years. Currently you lead UNC by 14 and Kansas by 21, and at this rate your team will lose that title in a few years.
These are only the top five reasons that prove Kansas deserves this title. I realize I am a KU fan, but I am approaching this from an unbias perspective. UCLA can make a strong case considering they have the most title by far, and one of, if not the, greatest coach in the history of the game. Duke CANNOT make this claim considering they are such a new success story. The history is not there, and there needs to be a lot more wins for them to be included in the argument. Not disrecpect, Coach K is a great coach, but they have a lot of ground to make up. And with Coach K’s traditional coaching style it will take only a small lull for them to fall off due to his old school coaching technique.
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UK will rise again….. DeAndre Ligins is a beast and he is going to be a star just like anyone else Billy G. recruits.
The time of Tubby is over finally UK can get some recruits in. Thats wy we havent done anthing recentlly is because Tubby got lazy and expected Kids to run thru the doors. Billy can recruit and Kentucky will win it all in atleast 3 years
I agree that Kentucky is on top at this point in time…There is nothing else in the state to get behind….no pro sport teams….UK football hasn’t been consistently good although Brooks is trying to change that. So…The whole state gets behind the cats and the games have an NBA atmosphere! However with Roy Williams at the helm at NC things could change in the future…..He’s the perfect fit for that program and a in this Wildcat fans opinion a class guy!
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