Top 10 NCAA Tournament First Round Upsets

The bands. The buzzer-beaters. The unproductive offices. Must be the start of the NCAA men's basketball tournament. To mark this year's edition, we scoured the record books to select the 10 best first round upsets in tournament history

(13) Princeton 43, (4) UCLA 41, 1996

Players on the Princeton bench celebrate as Princeton takes the lead from UCLA late in the second half during the first round of the NCAA Southeast Regional in Indianapolis on Thursday, March 14, 1996.

Tom Russo / AP

I was a member of this Princeton team that shocked UCLA—actually, member is too kind; I warmed the bench. So call me biased if you'd like, but Princeton's upset is a legit number one. Princeton's Hall of Fame coach, Pete Carril, had announced his retirement less than a week before the game, giving him one more shot at an upset after his Tigers lost by an average of 4 points in the opening round from 1989 to 1992 (Princeton's 50-49 loss to Georgetown in 1989 is still the closest a 16th seeded team has come to beating a top seed). Thanks to the final play, Carril avoided another tragic near-win. Princeton's Gabe Lewullis cut backdoor once, but the opportunity wasn't there. He cut again: Steve Goodrich bounced a perfect pass, Lewullis made a tricky lay-up, and the Tigers toppled the defending champs.

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