Add it to the list because George Mason’s improbable run to the Final Four is one of those feel-good, David versus Goliath kind of stories that don’t come along frequently enough in sports.
But without a title, it's not the greatest upset in sports history, but simply a great run.
By not beating Florida, the Patriots are simply a great story but fails to better the group of college players who beat the mighty Soviet Union hockey team before anyone on the George Mason roster was even born.
Still, it was a great run.
“I can only imagine the feeling they must have on that campus, in that locker room,” Connecticut coach Jim Calhoun said after the Huskies became victim No. 4 on Sunday. “It’s something they probably never imagined.”
It’s something hardly anyone imagined, even the Patriots faithful who saw their team lose twice to Hofstra just days before George Mason got what looked like a very charitable No. 11 seed into the tournament.
Three million people entered an ESPN.com contest to pick the national champion. Just 284 of them thought it might be the Patriots, and a close look at their e-mail addresses might find most of them go to George Mason.
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It seems the George Mason players weren't aware of how big two more wins could have been.
How big? Well, let’s start at the top, and work our way down a very elite list. Argue with them if you want, but these stand out:
Miracle on Ice
The win, of course, was immortalized by the famous call of Al Michaels, but what many forget is that the U.S. team still had to beat Finland a few days later to win the gold. The Americans did, but needed to score three goals in the final period to win 4-2.
Tyson-Douglas
No one could beat Mike Tyson. No one. He was the baddest man on the planet, so ferocious that opponents sometimes froze just walking into the ring. Not James “Buster” Douglas, who was a 42-1 underdog by the time the two met in Tokyo on Feb. 10, 1990. Douglas took the fight to Tyson, and survived a knockdown before stopping the champion in the 10th round to win the heavyweight title. Tyson only recently admitted he was never the same after the loss.
Arc: Syracuse is among a solid group of No. 1 seeds in our latest tournament projections, but the middle of the pack is much more murky.
Arc's five up, five down: After No. 11 Michigan State's 58-48 upset of No. 3 Ohio State, you'd be a fool to discount the Spartans' national title chances now.
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