BCS Schools and NCAA Basketball Final Four

In college football, there is the concept of the "BCS" conferences. These conferences are:
  • Big East
  • Southeastern Conference (SEC)
  • Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC)
  • Big Ten
  • Big 12
  • Pac 10
These 6 conferences generally get the lion's share of at-large bids to the NCAA tournament.

How often does a team from outside a BCS conference make it to the Final Four and/or the National Championship game in college basketball?

Using Wikipedia as a reference, here is the list going back to 1985. Note that going back that far includes references to conferences before the "big 6" really came to be. (It was also when the "Big 12" was known as the "Big 8" and before lots of other changes were made).
1985. Memphis State (Metro)
1986. Louisville (Metro)
1987. UNLV (Big West)
1988 and 1989. none
1990 and 1991. UNLV (Big West)
1992. Cincinnati (Great Midwest)
1993, 1994, and 1995. none
1996. Massachusetts (Atlantic 10)
1997. none
1998. Utah (Western Athletic)
1999, 2000, 2001, and 2002. none
2003. Marquette (Conference USA)
2004. none
2005. Louisville (Conference USA)
2006. George Mason (Colonial)
2007. none
2008. Memphis (Conference USA)

As you can see, if you count 1985 through 2008, that is 24 seasons, or 96 total Final Four participants. There have been 12 from outside the "big 6" conferences, which is 1 every 2 seasons. Only Louisville in 1986 and UNLV in 1990 won the National Championship.
So, I guess when filling out your bracket, putting teams from those BCS conferences in the Final Four is a pretty logical thing to do. If you do want to pick a team from outside to make it, only pick 1 (none of the years above listed 2 teams) and don't pick that team to win the National Championship. Memphis could have bucked that trend last year, but didn't.

If you start with 1998, there have only been 4 teams outside the "big 6" conferences to crash the party in the last 40 Final Four participants. That is just 1 every 2½ years.

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