March Madness winners and losers: Ex-UK coaches are up, Todd Golden is down
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Pitino leads St. John’s (30-6) to the Sweet 16 for first time since 1999.
- Todd Golden’s late-game plan led to Florida’s shocking round of 32 exit.
- Big Ten has six Sweet 16 teams; ACC left with only Duke.
Who is up and who is down after the first weekend of the 2026 men’s NCAA Basketball Tournament:
UP: Rick Pitino. Former top Cat Rick Pitino has led St. John’s to the round of 16 for the first time since 1999. The coach himself is coaching in the second weekend of an NCAA tourney for the first time since 2015 at Louisville.
After he was fired as U of L coach in 2017 following a succession of scandals in the program, Pitino’s college coaching career seemed deader than Myspace.
Yet it is a tribute to Pitino’s personal resilience and his immense coaching talent that he now seems fully rehabilitated at St. John’s.
The No. 5 seed Red Storm (30-6) now have a Sweet 16 shot against an injury-impacted No. 1 seed, Duke (34-2), that has looked vulnerable in NCAA tourney play.
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DOWN: Todd Golden. The Florida coach is not afraid to deploy unconventional strategies, and his team often benefits from his boldness.
But the No. 1 seed Gators’ bid for a repeat NCAA championship came to a shocking end in Sunday’s round of 32 when UF had a complete late-game meltdown in what became a 73-72 loss to No. 9 seed Iowa.
With Florida up 72-70 and 8.9 seconds remaining in the game, Iowa inbounded the ball in its own backcourt. Golden indicated following the game his strategy was to deny the ball to Hawkeyes star Bennett Stirtz, force an Iowa role player to catch the ball, then foul him.
The thought being that, under NCAA Tournament pressure, it would be hard for a role player to make two free throws. And, even if Iowa tied the game, Florida would still have a chance to win in regulation or would benefit as the more talented team if the game went to overtime.
Instead, Florida not only allowed an inbounds pass to Stirtz, it let the Iowa star catch the ball moving downhill toward the UF goal. That put the Gators’ Thomas Haugh in no-man’s land between stopping the ball or staying with Iowa’s Alvaro Folgueiras in the corner.
Stirtz dished the ball to Folgueiras, who drained the 3-pointer that — after Florida failed to get a shot off in the final 4.5 seconds — sent Iowa to the Sweet 16 for the first time since 1999.
For Golden and the Gators, it was a late-game failure of epic consequence.
UP: John Calipari. As Arkansas won the SEC Tournament and has advanced to the NCAA tourney round of 16, the narrative of a “resurgent Calipari” has captured the national media’s fancy.
Well, the Razorbacks beat the No. 11, No. 15 and No. 4 seeds to win the SEC tourney.
In the NCAA Tournament, the No. 4 seed Hogs have beaten a No. 13 seed and a No. 12 seed to reach the West Region semifinals.
At least by seeding, that’s a pretty soft path to “resurgence.”
Still, you can only beat who shows up to play you.
The Razorbacks will finally face a team seeded higher than them in this postseason when Arkansas plays No. 1 seed Arizona in the round of 16 on Thursday night.
DOWN: Hubert Davis. If media reports are accurate, No. 6 seed North Carolina blowing a 19-point second-half lead and losing to No. 11 seed VCU 82-78 in overtime in the round of 64 is likely going to cost the Tar Heels coach his job.
Given that Davis was playing without his team’s most talented player, freshman forward Caleb Wilson, due to injury, that seems unfair to me.
But since coaching UNC to the 2022 national title game, Davis has gone 2-3 in NCAA Tournament contests with back-to-back losses in the round of 64.
UP: Rick Barnes. By leading Tennessee to at least the Sweet 16 for the fourth straight year, Barnes has won 10 NCAA Tournament games since 2023.
People who still hold on to the knock on Barnes from his Texas days that he underperformed in the postseason are way out of date.
DOWN: Mark Few. After coaching Gonzaga to nine straight trips to the Sweet 16 from 2016 through 2014, Few and the Zags have now gone out in the round of 32 the past two seasons, losing to Houston in 2025 and to No. 11 seed Texas on Saturday night.
UP: The Big Ten. Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Nebraska and Purdue give the Big Ten six of the Sweet 16, the most of any league.
To be determined is whether there is a team from among that six that can give the Big Ten its first men’s NCAA Tournament championship since Michigan State in 2000.
For my money, Michigan and Illinois are the two best teams, but Purdue and Michigan State have the best routes to making the Final Four.
DOWN: The ACC. Duke is the only Atlantic Coast Conference team remaining in the NCAA tourney. Jon Scheyer’s Blue Devils were the only ACC team in last season’s Sweet 16, too.
It has been a mighty fall for the conference that was once undisputed king of men’s college hoops.
