Sigh.....ya learn something new every day.
Enter the 1944-1945 season of Iowa basketball.
The Hawkeyes won their 3rd Big Ten title in school history and first in 19 years, finishing a full game ahead of second place Ohio State amassing a 17-1 overall record and 11-1 in conference.
Iowa's only loss that year was by 1 point at Illinois, a game they avenged in their regular season finale.
Fun side note, Iowa State also won the Big 6 (8) that year, a season after going to the Final Four.
But for whatever reason, neither team got to appear in the 1945 NCAA Tournament.............
Ohio State however, and also a year removed from a Final Four appearance, got to go to the NCAA Tournament with their 14-4 record......because reasons until I can prove otherwise.
This was back when the NCAA Tournament was only 8 teams deep. So winning one game meant you get a Final Four banner to hang from the rafters!!!
Even better yet, this was still a few years prior to the AP doing a weekly poll for college basketball, like they started doing for football in 1936. At the time, there was one major power ranking system that retroactively ranked teams every season from 1895 to the final season of the non-AP poll era, called the Premo-Porretta Power Poll.
And despite Oklahoma A&M (State) going on to win the NCAA Tournament, it was Iowa that they declared the retroactive National Champions of that season.
Now, you're probably asking, why would I say 'unfortunate BAU'........
Well, that's because we probably didn't go to the NCAA Tournament because our University probably didn't allow its athletic teams to participate in postseason play!!!
Now I didn't investigate too deep to confirm that, but seeing as how that's why Iowa couldn't go to the 1921 Rose Bowl, a year in which we were also rewarded a retroactive National Championship, I can only assume that's the case here as well.
And it's f***ing BAU because in the history of Iowa athletics, they had a tendency to always get in their own way of true success. Sometimes it was out of their control, and sometimes it was very much by their own doing.....................................
And this seems like a case where we got in our own f***ing way, because #academicssufferwhenyouparticipateinaf***ingpostseasoneventyouf***inga**holesattheUniversityofIowaresponsiblefornotallowingteamstoparticipateinf***ingpostseasonevents.............youf***inga**holes. /hashtag
(And yes all of those people have probably passed on by now, but it is the thought that matters to me.......)
P.S. Of course, if it turns out that it wasn't the University's fault, and the NCAA just blackballed us and Iowa State so that the f***ing Tufts College Jumbos (I'm not making that up) could go to the NCAA Tournament, then I take back what I said.
Enter the 1944-1945 season of Iowa basketball.
The Hawkeyes won their 3rd Big Ten title in school history and first in 19 years, finishing a full game ahead of second place Ohio State amassing a 17-1 overall record and 11-1 in conference.
Iowa's only loss that year was by 1 point at Illinois, a game they avenged in their regular season finale.
Fun side note, Iowa State also won the Big 6 (8) that year, a season after going to the Final Four.
But for whatever reason, neither team got to appear in the 1945 NCAA Tournament.............
Ohio State however, and also a year removed from a Final Four appearance, got to go to the NCAA Tournament with their 14-4 record......because reasons until I can prove otherwise.
This was back when the NCAA Tournament was only 8 teams deep. So winning one game meant you get a Final Four banner to hang from the rafters!!!
Even better yet, this was still a few years prior to the AP doing a weekly poll for college basketball, like they started doing for football in 1936. At the time, there was one major power ranking system that retroactively ranked teams every season from 1895 to the final season of the non-AP poll era, called the Premo-Porretta Power Poll.
And despite Oklahoma A&M (State) going on to win the NCAA Tournament, it was Iowa that they declared the retroactive National Champions of that season.
Now, you're probably asking, why would I say 'unfortunate BAU'........
Well, that's because we probably didn't go to the NCAA Tournament because our University probably didn't allow its athletic teams to participate in postseason play!!!
Now I didn't investigate too deep to confirm that, but seeing as how that's why Iowa couldn't go to the 1921 Rose Bowl, a year in which we were also rewarded a retroactive National Championship, I can only assume that's the case here as well.
And it's f***ing BAU because in the history of Iowa athletics, they had a tendency to always get in their own way of true success. Sometimes it was out of their control, and sometimes it was very much by their own doing.....................................
And this seems like a case where we got in our own f***ing way, because #academicssufferwhenyouparticipateinaf***ingpostseasoneventyouf***inga**holesattheUniversityofIowaresponsiblefornotallowingteamstoparticipateinf***ingpostseasonevents.............youf***inga**holes. /hashtag
(And yes all of those people have probably passed on by now, but it is the thought that matters to me.......
)P.S. Of course, if it turns out that it wasn't the University's fault, and the NCAA just blackballed us and Iowa State so that the f***ing Tufts College Jumbos (I'm not making that up) could go to the NCAA Tournament, then I take back what I said.
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