The biggest NCAA Tournament snubs in Nevada Wolf Pack basketball history

Despite its quarterfinal loss to Colorado State in the Mountain West Tournament, literally no one is expecting the Nevada men’s basketball team to miss out on this year’s NCAA Tournament.

The Wolf Pack broke into the rankings in the AP Top 25 and USA TODAY Sports Coaches’ Poll earlier this week, landing at Nos. 23 and 22, respectively. And despite the Thursday night loss, Nevada was in every single one of the 106 predictions tracked by bracketmatrix.com; the consensus was that Nevada would land as a 7-seed when tournament selections are announced on Sunday.

Still, only conference tournament champions get automatic invitations to March Madness, so the 26-win Wolf Pack will have to await their fate. And strange things can happen when Selection Sunday rolls around, especially for teams outside the traditional basketball powerhouse conferences:

• 2004: Utah State was ranked No. 22 in the nation in the final poll with a 25-4 overall record, but was denied a spot in the 65-team field that year.
• 2012: Drexel wrapped up the season winning 19 out of 20 to finish with a record of 29-7, but didn’t get one of the 68 invitations that year.
• 2015: Colorado State had a 27-6 record going into Selection Sunday, but was shut out of the 68-team bracket.
• 2018: Saint Mary’s was 28-5, with one of their wins on the road against 13th-ranked Gonzaga, and ranked 20th in the nation, but didn’t get the call to join the 68-team tournament.

While we wait to find out where the Pack will play its postseason games, let’s take a look at some of the biggest snubs in Nevada basketball history.

2011-12: Under third-year head coach David Carter and starring Deonte Burton, Malik Story and Olek Czyz, Nevada had compiled a 26-6 record and a regular-season title in the Western Athletic Conference. But after losing in the WAC conference tournament, they had to settle for a No. 5 seed in the National Invitational Tournament instead of going to the Big Dance. They wrapped up their season with a quarterfinal loss to eventual NIT champion Stanford.

1996-97: If the Wolf Pack ever had an argument to get an at-large bid prior to the 2000s, it was this team under head coach Pat Foster, with Nevada Hall-of-Famer Faron Hand leading the squad to a 20-9 record and a first-place regular-season finish in the Big West’s eastern division. But a 20-win season against a lightly regarded Big West schedule didn’t impress the selection committee. The team ended its season with a second-round loss to Nebraska in the NIT.

1978-79: The Pack had a high-powered offense — 24th in the nation in points per game with 82.9 — and a home win against 14th-ranked Georgetown, but its 20-6 record in the West Coast Athletic Conference wasn’t enough to catch the attention of the selection committee.

1945-46: True, there was little chance that Nevada would head to the eight-team NCAA tournament in 1946. Under head coach Jake Lawlor, they had compiled a 26-4 regular season record — but their competition included several non-collegiate opponents, including the amateur Olympic Club of San Francisco, and military teams including the Fallon Navy and the Treasure Island Armed Guard. The team did get an invitation to the NAIA basketball tournament that year in Kansas City, where they had four starters foul out in a quarterfinal loss to Southern Illinois. Their .848 win percentage (28-5 overall) is still the third-best in school history.

Numerous Nevada women’s basketball seasons: A total of 296 women’s basketball teams have competed in the NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament, but the Wolf Pack is still on the outside looking in. Despite impressive squads like the 22-11 team in 2010-11 (which picked up regular-season wins against tournament participants Louisiana Tech and NC State) and the 1985-86 team that finished with a school-best .680 win percentage, no Wolf Pack women’s team has gone on to the NCAA Tournament.