I hinted in Marty's very fine FanPost that I might try to compile some data showing how KU's NCAA tournament losses stack up to the other teams that lead the nation in NCAA tournament wins since Bill Self came to KU. A couple of notes on the data: I only counted NCAA losses. If a team won the national championship, that did not affect their score. Similarly, if a team missed the tournament in a given year (or years, coughUCLAcoughUCONNcoughFLORIDAcough), that fact did not affect their score.

As a recap, here is the data for KU over the same span:

2004: KU 4; GT 3 (1)

2005: KU 3; Bucknell 14 (-11)

2006: KU 4; Bradley 13 (-9)

2007: KU 1; UCLA 2 (-1)

2008: National Champs

2009: KU 3; Mich. St. 2 (1)

2010: KU 1; UNI 9 (-8)

2011: KU 1; VCU 11 (-10)

Total loss-seed disparity: -5.28 per loss

Follows the data I compiled:

UConn

2004: NCAA Title

2005: 2 (10): (-8)

2006: 1 (11): (-10)

2007: DNP

2008: 4 (13): (-9)

2009: 1 (2): (-1)

2010: DNP

2011: NCAA Title

UConn Total: -28 (4): -7

UNC

2004: 6 (3): (+3)

2005: NCAA Title

2006: 3 (11): (-8)

2007: 1 (2): (-1)

2008: 1 (1): (0)

2009: NCAA Title

2010: DNP

2011: 2 (4): (-2)

UNC Total: -8 (5): -1.6

Duke

2004: 1 (2): (-1)

2005: 1 (5): (-4)

2006: 1 (4): (-3)

2007: 6 (11): (-5)

2008: 2 (7): (-5)

2009: 2 (3): (-1)

2010: NCAA Title

2011: 1 (5): (-4)

Duke Total: -23 (7): -3.3

Mich. St.

2004: MSU 7; Nevada 10 (-3)

2005: 5 (1): (+4)

2006: 6 (11): (-5)

2007: 9 (1): (+8)

2008: 5 (1): (+4)

2009: 2 (1): (+1)

2010: 5 (5): (0)

2011: 10 (7): (+3)

Mich. St. Total: 12 (8): +1.5

Kentucky

2004: UK 1; UAB 9 (-8)

2005: 2 (5) (-3)

2006: 8 (1): (+7)

2007: 8 (1): (+7)

2008: 11 (6): (+5)

2009: DNP

2010: 1 (2): (-1)

2011: 4 (3): (-1)

Kentucky Total: +6 (7): +.85

Florida

2004: 5 (12): (-7)

2005: 4 (5) (-1)

2006: NCAA Title

2007: NCAA Title

2008: DNP

2009: DNP

2010: 10 (7): (+3)

2011: 2 (8): (-6)

Florida Total: -11 (4): -2.75

Texas

2004: 3 (7): (-4)

2005: 8 (9): (-1)

2006: 2 (4): (-2)

2007: 4 (5): (-1)

2008: 2 (1): (+1)

2009: 7 (2): (-5)

2010: 8 (9): (-1)

2011: 4 (5): (-1)

Texas Total: -14 (8): -1.75

UCLA

2004: DNP

2005: 11 (7): (+4)

2006: 2 (3): (-1)

2007: 2 (1): (+1)

2008: 1 (1): (0)

2009: 6 (3): (+3)

2010: DNP

2011: 7 (2): (+5)

UCLA Total: +12 (6): +2

A couple of conclusions: UConn's score is slightly skewed by the fact that they only had 4 NCAA losses over the past 8 years (2 titles, 2 DNPs), but still significantly higher than KU's. That said, UConn is the only school that even approaches KU's loss-seed disparity. Of course KU is largely a victim of its own success. It's never been seeded worse than a 4 seed since 2001 (let that sink in here for a bit), so, like Duke, for instance, KU's losses are much more likely to be to a worse seed. A team like Michigan St., on the other hand, is seldom better than a 5 seed, so its tournament success has largely come at the expense of better-seeded teams, and further, its losses are usually to higher seeds.

So what's the point, exactly? I'm not sure. I'm not going to sit here and say that HCBS can't coach in the big game (we all know that's simply not true), but his teams do tend to (dare I say the word?) choke when they're heavily expected to win. Not every time, obviously, but it's happened more frequently than any of us would like to admit or remember.

Anyway, these are the numbers. Discuss!