Whenever March Madness rolls around, the college basketball world and even fans who only watch in March all converge to enjoy the thrills, chills and busted brackets of the NCAA Tournament. The 68-team bracket is one of the greatest joys in all of sports, but it's also worth noting that, even though the NCAA has leaned all the way into it, March Madness is actually just a nickname for it. So too is the "Big Dance".
Particularly during conference championship week, college hoops fans frequently hear about teams punching their tickets to the Big Dance. They're obviously talking about March Madness when they say it and many fans just accept that as a common nickname.
Yet, some fans with curious and inquiring minds might ultimately be wondering why. Why is the NCAA Tournament and March Madness also called the Big Dance? Well, there's actually a pretty cool historical reason behind that.
Why is March Madness and the NCAA Tournament also called the Big Dance?
The Big Dance comes from Marquette basketball coach Al McGuire, who explained to a reporter in 1977 that “you gotta wear the blue blazer when you go to the big dance.” Marquette won the championship that year, so everyone started calling the tournament “the Big Dance.”
This is, arguably, one of the dumbest origin stories of any commonly used and widely marketed synonym. McGuire wore a bright blue blazer through Marquette’s winning season and committed to wearing it through his team’s tournament run. This is commendable. One can always appreciate and should always honor superstitious behavior, the more ridiculous, the better. However, why did McGuire call the tournament The Big Dance? And why did The Big Dance, specifically, stick? Why not Bright Blue Blazer Time?
Yes, there is admittedly a nice synergy between The Big Dance and another noted tourney term, Cinderella. Cinderellas looking for their One Shining Moment at the Big Dance makes a certain kind of sense, but of course, none of these three terms are particularly related to each other or causal in any way. They’re just conveniently coherent as an extended analogy.
Congratulations to the 1977 Marquette men’s basketball team and their coach Al McGuire. Shout out to his bright blue blazer. But one has to imagine that championship winning coaches have said more interesting iconic things we could have chosen to name a whole tournament after.
The 2025 NCAA Tournament, this year's Big Dance, begins on Thursday, March 20 with the Round of 64 games. The Final Four will then take place on Saturday, April 5 with the National Championship Game being played on Monday, April 7 this year. We'll see how many coaches followed suit and wore their blue blazers.