One year Sean and I watched a very low seed VCU upset a number one seed Duke. That was fun to watch and the crowd in Buffalo certainly went for the underdog. It was amusing to see all of the upset Duke fans crying in the stands. That year VCU wasn't a Cinderella team beyond that one game. Not like Saint Peter's was this year.
Saint Peter's was a number 15 seed and they first upset number 2 seed Kentucky in the first round. That one game busted a lot of people's brackets as many folks had Kentucky going to the Final Four. In the second round they beat number 7 seed Murray State. That was an exciting game as neither team had ever gone beyond the second round into the Sweet Sixteen and both teams would have gone on to be an underdog. Saint Peter's won that game by ten points but it was a highly entertaining game that was very close throughout the night.
They moved on into the Sweet Sixteen and played Purdue. We had seen Purdue a couple of times throughout the Tournament and thought Saint Peter's would be lucky to just have made it into this round but they played their hearts out again and won. It was another very exciting and close game that went down to the very last seconds. It was almost shocking the way they beat Purdue and moved into the Elite Eight where they were the first number 15 seed to ever advance that far into the tournament.
The other teams making it into the Final Four were set by the time of the North Carolina and Saint Peter's game on Sunday night. It would be the winner of this game along with Villanova, Kansas and Duke which were all number 2 or 1 seeds.
North Carolina did their homework and were prepared for Saint Peter's. They dominated them in every aspect of the game and led by twenty points all afternoon. The Peacocks never had a chance and were not getting past number 8 seed North Carolina. Saint Peter's had their run and now it was over.
There was an interesting statistic which illustrated that the four teams with the most tournament wins in the history of the tournament were all in the 2022 Final Four. North Carolina, Kansas, Duke and Villanova were the winningest college teams of all time and there they were together. This was not a particular unusual Final Four bracket.
Another note of personal interest is that the fifth team in that all time list of winning teams was Temple University. They didn't usually get very far in the tournaments but they did seem to get in almost every year and usually one some games every year which added up enough to get them the number five spot in the all time wining list.
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