Week 13

It's always fun to take a look back on past seasons and see how teams moved up or down the rankings from mid-season to the Final Four. I do this because I wanted to see if my hometown Gophers had any shot at making the Final Four as they've dropped from the top 25 in the most recent rankings.

Here are the last ten Final Fours, listed as (Championship team, runner-up, final four team, final team) as well as their AP ranking in week 13 of that season. I then list the AP's top four teams in week 13 of that particular season.

'98-'99 UConn (2) over Duke (1), OSU (13), Mich St. (5)
1. Duke, 2. UConn, 3. Auburn, 4. Cincy

'99-'00 Michigan State (6) over Florida (12), Wisconsin (UR), UNC (UR)
1. Cincy, 2. Stanford, 3. Duke, 4. Syracuse

'00-'01 Duke (3) over Arizona (11), Maryland (13), Mich St.(4)
1. UNC, 2. Stanford, 3. Duke, 4. Mich St.

'01-'02 Maryland (3) over Indiana (UR), Kansas (2), Oklahoma (4)
1. Duke, 2. Kansas, 3. Maryland, 4. Oklahoma

'02-'03 Syracuse (17) over Kansas (9), Marquette (11), Texas (6)
1. Arizona, 2. Louisville, 3. Kentucky, 4. Florida

'03-'04 UConn (8) over Georgia Tech (18), Okla St (7), Duke (3)
1. Stanford, 2. St. Joe's, 3. Duke, 4. Miss St.

'04-'05 UNC (4) over Illinois (1), Louisville (12), Mich S. (11)
1.Illinois, 2. Kansas, 3. Kentucky, 4. UNC

'05-'06 Florida (10) over UCLA (15), LSU (25), George Mason (UR)
1. UConn, 2. Duke, 3. Memphis, 4. Villanova

'06-'07 Florida (1) over OSU (3), UCLA (2), Georgetown (22)
1. Florida, 2. UCLA, 3. OSU, 4. Wisconsin

'07-'08 Kansas (4) over Memphis (1), UNC (3), UCLA (5)
1. Memphis, 2. Duke, 3. UNC, 4. Kansas


Some interesting stats in te last ten years:

40% of teams ranked #1 after week 13 have reaced the championship game.
10% of temas ranked #1 after week 13 win the championship (1 out of 10).

10% of final four teams since '98-'99 were unranked in week 13 (4 of 40).

The average AP ranking of a final four team at week 13 is 9.6 (ideally, it would be 2.5)