5 best NCAA basketball teams that never won the national championship

3. Best NCAA basketball teams to never win a national championship: 1984-85 Georgetown Hoyas were victims of one of the sport’s greatest upsets

They may not be very relevant now, but the Georgetown Hoyas were one of the most prominent college basketball programs of the early 1980s. The sudden surge to the top of the college basketball world coincided with the arrival of one of the nation’s best recruits, center Patrick Ewing.

With the addition of Ewing, the Hoyas reached the national championship game in 1982, where they lost to North Carolina after a young Michael Jordan hit the winning shot. Ewing got his championship two years later when the Hoyas knocked off Houston in the title game, making the 1984-85 season a quest to repeat.

Georgetown certainly entered the season on a mission, dominating Big East play from the jump. The only two regular-season games that Georgetown lost came by a combined three points to St. John’s and Syracuse, both of which were avenged at the end of the season.

The NCAA Tournament appeared to be a formality for Georgetown, which entered March Madness with a ridiculous 30-2 record. The Hoyas easily advanced to the Final Four, where they beat St. John’s again by 18 to get to the championship game against conference rival Villanova.

The Wildcats had lost twice to the Hoyas during the regular season, but head coach Rollie Massimino had Villanova slow the tempo down to a crawl to limit possessions. The strategy worked as Villanova pulled off the upset, winning by two to deny the Hoyas a second straight title.