What’s the lowest seed to win March Madness? A look at the biggest upsets in NCAA Tournament history

March Madness is full of upsets that no one sees coming, but that’s largely limited to the first and second rounds. Do Cinderellas ever make it to the Final Four, or Championship Game?

Winning the entirety of March Madness takes grit and mental toughness. Throughout the course of the tournament, any college basketball team is likely to run into some unfamiliar scenarios — situations which might scare off pretenders.

What’s great about March, however, is that the contender and pretender terminology isn’t directly correlated to the seeding. That’s all based on the opinion of the committee, which often uses flawed knowledge to make such assumptions.

What’s the lowest seed to win March Madness?

The lowest seed to ever win the entire tournament is an 8-seed, which has occurred twice in NCAA Tournament history. Just last season, the North Carolina Tar Heels reached the Final Four and Championship Game as an eight-seed. They lost to Kansas, however. The only eight-seed to win the entire tournament was Villanova in 1985, which knocked off Georgetown. They are the lowest-seeded team to pull off such an accomplishment.

What’s the lowest seed to reach the Final Four?

Four 11 seeds have reached the Final Four, and all have been in recent memory — LSU in 1986, George Mason in 2006, VCU in 2011, Loyola Chicago in 2018 and UCLA in 2021. None of those teams won the National Championship, but reaching the Final Four while going through such a gauntlet schedule is an impressive enough accomplishment.

Has a No.16 seed ever beaten a No. 1 seed?

Yes. UMBC knocked off a No. 1-seeded Virginia Cavaliers team in 2018. The scoreline wasn’t particularly close, as the Retrievers won by 20 points. UVA struggled to score consistently from the outside, while their typically-stout defense couldn’t contain UMBC. After being tied at the half, UMBC outscored Virginia by 20 points in the second half.