The SEC Has Made Impressive NCAA Tournament History
03/24/2025 10:57 AM
The SEC was viewed as the best conference in basketball - and maybe the best conference in men's basketball history - throughout the 2024-25 season. The league got 14 teams into the 2025 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament. And it has fully lived up to the hype in the Big Dance.
Over the weekend, the SEC made history during the 2025 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament, in terms of how many teams reached the Sweet 16.
The Sweet 16 is officially set following the opening weekend, with third round games set for Thursday and Friday evening, which should be a lot of fun.
The SEC made NCAA Tournament history over the weekend, getting seven teams into the Sweet 16. It's the most by one conference in the history of the Big Dance.
The SEC will have No. 1 seed Auburn (South), No. 6 seed Ole Miss (South), No. 1 seed Florida (West), No. 10 seed Arkansas (West), No. 2 seed Alabama (East), No. 2 seed Tennessee (Midwest) and No. 3 seed Kentucky (Midwest).
Two SEC teams will be playing each other in the Sweet 16, as Kentucky and Tennessee will be playing on Friday evening. You could then have multiple SEC teams battling each other in the Elite Eight over the weekend, depending on how things shake out in the Sweet 16 games.
The ACC had previously set the record for most teams in the Sweet 16, when the conference got six teams in the Sweet 16 during the 2016 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament.
It's official....
— Peter Burns (@PeterBurnsESPN) March 24, 2025
The @SEC now owns the record for the most amount of the teams from a single conference to make the Sweet 16 with 7.
The previous record was the ACC with 6 teams in the Sweet 16 in 2016.#ItJustMeansMorepic.twitter.com/PF2FopVfy3
It'll be fun to see how many SEC teams reach the Elite Eight and Final Four. There will probably be at least one or two SEC teams in the Final Four this year, if not more. And with teams like Florida, Auburn, Tennessee and Kentucky, the league is certainly in play to win the national championship.
Many would probably go with Duke to win it all right now - and that's certainly a fair pick - but the SEC has proven to be the best conference in the country from start to near-finish this year.
