Get a Grip Guys and Gals: Premier Programs Always Rebound From Droughts

"Nothing in the affairs of men is worthy of great anxiety." - Plato

The sky is falling! The sky is falling! Self-righteous Chicken Little fans, high pot-smokers galore and willfully dense media members, sounding like end-of-the-world doom-and-gloomers from the whiny race-baiting Blame America Administration, can get on your nerves because of their lack of historical perspective.

Recent slumps for Baylor, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa State, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio State, Oklahoma State, Oregon and Wisconsin were disconcerting to their fans but they shouldn't be on suicide watch. Plenty of premier programs recover from dry-spell reversals, even against inferior opponents, to return to elite status.

A comparable little slump happened to Kansas last year before the Jayhawks eventually posted their fourth straight 30-win campaign. KU fans should have remembered that Wilt Chamberlain's final season in 1958 included one of the most amazing turnarounds in NCAA history. Nebraska, in the midst of 15 consecutive losing seasons, was clobbered at Kansas by 56 points (102-46) before upsetting the Jayhawks (43-41) four games later in Omaha. In the Cornhuskers' next outing, they defeated top-ranked Kansas State (55-48), an opponent overwhelming them by a total of 46 points in two previous matchups. Nebraska never has won an NCAA Tournament game, making the Cornhuskers treasure the moment even more when they defeated NCAA champion-to-be Kansas in the regular season in 1988.

Cincinnati, compiling just one winning record in Metro Conference competition (8-6 in 1985) in 12 years from 1978 through 1989, is the only school to register a losing record in a season it won a road game against a conference rival that later became NCAA champion. The 12-16 Bearcats, notching a 5-7 Metro mark, won at Louisville (84-82) midway through the 1985-86 campaign when guard Roger McClendon poured in 24 of his 35 points in the second half. The Cardinals recovered from their only home-court loss that year and the embarrassment of squandering a 13-point, second-half lead against Cincinnati to wind up capturing the NCAA title.

Michigan State dominated the 1979 NCAA Tournament, handing each of its five playoff opponents, a quintet averaging 25.6 victories, their worst defeat of the year - Lamar (31-point margin), LSU (16), Notre Dame (12), Penn (34) and Indiana State (11). Consequently, most observers don't recall the glaring defect of the Magic Johnson-led Spartans earlier that season when they were defeated by four Big Ten Conference second-division teams (including three finishing the year at least four games below .500 in league competition). One of Michigan State's setbacks was by 18 points against perennial cellar dweller Northwestern, which had 35 consecutive losing league records from 1969 through 2003.

Florida '98 is the only school at least four games below .500 in league play to win on the road against a conference opponent (Kentucky) that wound up capturing the NCAA Tournament crown later that season. The Gators went on to become the only school to capture back-to-back NCAA titles despite losing a league game each year to an opponent with a conference mark at least four games below .500 (2006 and 2007).

Plato's quote about anxiety takes on a special meaning for hoop fans examining the following chronological list of 11 schools at least four games under .500 in conference competition defeating a league rival ending the season as NCAA titlist (including four of them in an eight-year span from 2003 through 2010):