The same teams ALMOST every year..no matter what the sport.

[Xavier2005]

NFL, MLB, NBA, and the NCAA regarding the sports football and basketball mainly: Almost every year, even before the season starts, we can discard a minimum of 80% to 90% of the competing teams from reaching any type of playoffs. And with almost 95% to 100% we can predict who the final 2 to 4 teams will be in any type of play off. Half way through any NFL or NBA or MLB season we all know the teams that have no chance for any play off. Each league has about 4 to 6 teams which are expected and will be in the play offs. The NCAA football and basketball play offs and those expected to win it all are always narrowed down to about 8 teams maximum, many times less than 8. For the NCAA Tournament this year ....many "so called experts" said...out of this field of 68....there are only 8 teams which have any chance of winning it all and or making the Final Four. The other 60 teams are just fluff. Once in a blue moon a Cinderella might cut into the FF, but that is a rare occasion. The point....play off teams and championships are generally won by the same power teams!!!!!

[xu koop scoop]

Won't disagree with subject, but I frequently glue myself to the 1st weekend of NCAA Tourney Games and depending on who's left watch fewer games the 2nd weekend and possibly skip the Final 4 & especially the Finals if it's all Power Teams from the Past, unless their's local flavor

[mumuskie87]

For me it is still the best time of the year from a sports standpoint but agree Xavier 2005 that it's a couple handful's of schools that will make the Final 4.
Last 16 years - from 2001 thru 2016 - there were a total of 16 schools that made 2 or more F4 appearances.
That's just under 5% of the D1 schools that accounted for just over 75% of the F4 appearances in that time frame.
Michigan St leads the way with 5.
Duke, UK, UConn and Kansas all had 4
U of L, UCLA, Syracuse and Florida had 3.
Syracuse and UConn are not it this years tournament but would not be surprised to see couple of these schools in this years F4.
Unfortunately, UCLA, UK and UNC are in the same regional so only 1 can make the F4

There only 4 schools that are not in a power conference (ACC, B10, B12, SEC, BE and PAC12) that made F4 appearance in this time frame -
George Mason, Memphis, VCU and Wichita St.
Actually Butler counts since at the time they were in the Horizon League when they went to back to back F4's.