2022 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament By The Numbers

The 2022 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament is officially set, and there is history on the line.

But while a host of teams and players will be seeking to carve out their own history in the Big Dance, this is a great time to take a look into the past and examine the numbers that will define the next three weeks of basketball action.

Here are the numbers to know.

GENERAL

1: Only one of the past seven national champions (2017-18 Villanova) won its conference tournament.

7: The most schools from a single state to appear in the NCAA Tournament is seven. That has happened three times: once by California (2002) and twice by Texas (2010, 2021).

8: The No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the final AP Poll have met only eight times in the national championship game. The No. 2 teams have won five of those eight matchups. Most recently, No. 2 North Carolina defeated No. 1 Illinois 75-70 in the 2005 final.

11: The lowest seed to reach a Final Four is No. 11, which has happened five times. The lowest-seeded team to win a national championship is 8-seed Villanova, which defeated No. 1 Georgetown in 1985.

12: 12-seeds have won at least one first-round game in 31 of the past 36 tournaments, with the only exceptions coming in 1988, 2000, 2007, 2015 and 2018.

16: Only one 16-seed (UMBC in 2018) has ever won a tournament game (excluding the First Four play-in games), making them 1-144 (.007) all time.

25: Since seeding began in 1979, 25 No. 1 seeds have won national championships, the most of any seed. Eleven of the past 14 champions have been No. 1 seeds. No. 2 seeds are next, with seven titles, followed by 3-seeds with five and 6-seeds with two. A No. 5 seed has never won the title.

26: Since the selection committee began seeding every team in 1979, the highest combined seed total of the Final Four is 26 (2011: No. 3 Connecticut, No. 4 Kentucky, No. 8 Butler, No. 11 VCU). Only one time have all four No. 1 seeds reached the Final Four (2008).

TEAM/PLAYER RECORDS AND MILESTONES 

11: UCLA holds the record for most championships, with 11. Following the Bruins are Kentucky (eight), North Carolina (six), Duke (five) and Indiana (five).

17: The Tar Heels have been a No. 1 seed a record 17 times. Duke and Kansas are next, with 14 each. North Carolina also holds the record for most Final Four appearances, with 20.

23: The most career NCAA Tournament games played is 23, by Duke's Christian Laettner.

59: The most tournament appearances by a school (Kentucky) is 59. The record for consecutive tourney appearances is 31, an active streak held by Kansas.

61: The most points scored by a player in an NCAA Tournament game is 61, by Notre Dame's Austin Carr against Ohio in the first round in 1970.

69: The largest margin of victory in a game is 69, which came when Loyola Chicago beat Tennessee Tech 111-42 in 1963.

149: The most points scored by a team in a single game is 149, by Loyola Marymount in a 149-115 win over Michigan in 1990.

184: The most points scored by a player in a tournament is 184 by Michigan's Glen Rice in 1989.

COACHING RECORDS AND MILESTONES 

1: Steve Fisher (1989, Michigan) is the only person to win a national championship in his first year as a head coach. Only three have won it all in their first year at a school, with Cincinnati's Ed Jucker (1961) and Kentucky's Tubby Smith (1998) joining Fisher.

2: Only Rick Pitino has won a title at two schools (1996 at Kentucky, 2013 at Louisville).

12: The most Final Four appearances by a head coach, shared by UCLA's John Wooden and Duke's Mike Krzyzewski. Coach K has also made the most tournament appearances (35), a record he shares with Syracuse's Jim Boeheim.

23: Tom Izzo of Michigan State has the longest active tournament streak, with 23 appearances (1998-2021).

97: That's the most tournament wins by a head coach, and again, it's Coach K on top.