Written by Adam Brown
On Thursday night, March 27, my beloved Duke Blue Devils fell to the Arizona Wildcats by a score of 93-77 in the West regional semifinal (Sweet 16) in Anaheim, Calif.
While I had expected to write about the likelihood of a repeat national championship for my Blue Devils, I’ve thought over the last 12 hours or soabout how hard that is to do in sports today, unless your name is Phil Jackson and you have guys like Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant on your team.
In the history of the NCAA Tournament, seven teams have won consecutive nationalchampionships,but only two of them (Duke and Florida) have done it since the tournament expanded to 64 teams in 1986.
Florida, remarkably, accomplished the feat with the exact same starting lineup. Six times, the reigning champion failed to qualify for the tournament the following year, most recently in 2008 when Florida (winners in 2006 and 2007) went to the Not Invited Tournament (really the National Invitational Tournament, but who cares?).
No column about repeating as champions in sports would be complete without mentioning the legendary John Wooden, who led the UCLA Bruins to seven straight titles from 1967 to 1973. He also won three other championships in his career at the helm of UCLA, all 10 within a span of 12 years.
Why is it so hard to repeat in sports? Players leave, retire or get injured; team dynamics change; the list goes onand on. Reigning champions have targets on their backs that no other team has. As I mentioned earlier, Phil Jackson is the master of repeat. All 11 of his NBA championships have been in groups; not one has stood unaccompanied with another. He twice won three straight championships with the Bulls (1991-93, 96-98) and has won five championships with the Lakers (2000-02, 09-10).
Oh, and of course basketball legend Bill Russell. While he and Jackson have won an equal number of championships at 11, Russell and the Boston Celtics won eight straight championships from 1959 to 1966, the longest championship streak in professional basketball.
And then, there are losing streaks. I used to joke with my friend Taylor about his Clemson Tigers basketball team not winning an NCAA Tournament game since 1996. However, they won a game this year, so I can’t make those jokes anymore. Yeah, I know it is sad too. And look at the Chicago Cubs, they haven’t won the World Series in 102 years. The Arizona Cardinals haven’t won a championship since Harry Truman was in office (1947 for all you non- history majors). The cities of San Diego and Cleveland haven’t won a championship in 47 and 46 years, respectively.
Such is sports in America. Abounding in good fortune to some and torturing so many others.
