No Fortune Below .500: Quick Exits Loomed For Five Losing SEC Members

Mississippi State (8-10 in SEC) became the first school ever to receive an at-large berth three consecutive campaigns despite compiling a record below .500 in a power conference. The Bulldogs lost all three of those playoff openers. When will the Division I Committee and "impartial" media promoting leagues with which they have cozy business dealings realize a losing conference record probably should deny any team receiving an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament? In 35 of the last 41 tourneys, the selection committee awarded at least one at-large berth to a squad with a sub-.500 mark in a top-caliber league. If history holds form, the committee pretty much simply wasted everyone's time. Texas promptly lost its First Four outing against Xavier before Georgia was gorged by Gonzaga in opening round.

Mississippi State and four other SEC at-large entrants with losing league records exited in opening round. Since numbers never lie, the cold and hard facts are that Virginia '84 is the only team with a sub-.500 conference mark to reach the Final Four. Three years later, Louisiana State became the last at-large team with a losing league mark to reach a regional final.

Maryland (#5 in 1986 and #4 in 2004) earned the two best seeds for an at-large squad with a losing conference record. Syracuse '18 is the only school in this sub.-500 category in the previous 14 tourneys to advance to the Sweet 16. In the same span, a total of 15 mid-majors reached a regional final or beyond. This striking number of at-large mid-level success stories doesn't even include recent Final Four clubs such as Virginia Commonwealth '11 (fourth-place finisher in Atlantic 10) and Wichita State '13 (second in Missouri Valley). How much more evidence does the committee require to give top-notch mid-majors a closer look rather than issuing handouts to underachieving members of power alliances?

Oklahoma and Texas, registering anemic 6-12 records in the SEC this season, compiled the worst league mark for an at-large entrant. A breakdown of conference recipients of basically unwarranted at-large bids include the ACC (16), Big Ten (12), Big Eight/Big 12 (12), SEC (14), Big East (six) and Pacific-12 (two). After registering a 10-5 NCAA playoff mark from 1983 through 1987, teams in this suspect group went 31-54 from 1988 through 2025 first round (ACC 12-14, Big East 1-5, Big Eight/Big 12 5-12, Big Ten 10-12, Pac-12 0-2, SEC 6-17). This year, the six SEC teams joined the following list of underachieving power-league "losers" given preferential treatment over more worthy mid-major conference members: