1940 NCAA Basketball Tournament

Last updated
1940 NCAA Basketball Tournament
Teams8
Finals site Municipal Auditorium
Kansas City, Missouri
Champions Indiana Hoosiers (1st title, 1st title game,
1st Final Four)
Runner-up Kansas Jayhawks (1st title game,
1st Final Four)
Semifinalists
Winning coach Branch McCracken (1st title)
MOP Marvin Huffman (Indiana)
Attendance36,880
Top scorer Howard Engleman Kansas
(39 points)
NCAA Division I Men's Tournaments
« 1939 1941 »

The 1940 NCAA Basketball Tournament involved eight schools playing in single-elimination play to determine the participating champion of men's NCAA Division I college basketball. The second edition of the tournament began on March 20, 1940, and ended with the championship game on March 30 in Kansas City, Missouri. A total of eight games were played, including a single third place game in the West region.

Contents

Indiana, coached by Branch McCracken, won the tournament title with a 60–42 victory in the final game over Kansas, coached by Phog Allen. Marvin Huffman of Indiana was named the tournament's Most Outstanding Player.

This would be the only tournament to feature Springfield College, the school James Naismith worked for when he invented the sport of basketball. They were the first of fourteen colleges and universities to compete in the tournament that are no longer in Division I. This was also the first appearance of the Kansas Jayhawks, whose first coach was Naismith.

Locations

The following are the sites selected to host each round of the 1940 tournament:

Regionals

March 20 and 21
East Regional, Butler Fieldhouse, Indianapolis, Indiana
West Regional, Municipal Auditorium, Kansas City, Missouri

Championship Game

March 30
Municipal Auditorium, Kansas City, Missouri

The 1940 tournament saw only two venues in use. Butler Fieldhouse, the largest college basketball arena in the country at the time, hosted the East regional on the campus of Butler University. Butler Fieldhouse, later renamed Hinkle Fieldhouse, would not host another NCAA tournament game until 2021. In Kansas City, the Municipal Auditorium hosted both the West Regional and the Championship Game. The Auditorium would go on to host another nine finals, nine regionals and two early rounds by 1964. The tournament would not return to Indianapolis again until 1978, when Market Square Arena hosted first-round games.

Teams

East Regional - Indianapolis
SchoolCoachConferenceRecord
Duquesne Chick Davies Independent19–2
Indiana Branch McCracken Big Ten 17–3
Springfield Ed Hickox Independent16–2
Western Kentucky Ed Diddle SIAA 24–5
West Regional - Kansas City
SchoolCoachConferenceRecord
Colorado Frosty Cox Mountain States 17–2
Kansas Phog Allen Big Six 17–5
Rice Buster Brannon Southwest 21–2
USC Sam Barry Pacific Coast 19–2

Bracket

Quarterfinals Semifinals Finals
         
Indiana 48
Springfield 24
Indiana39
Duquesne 30
Duquesne 30
Western Kentucky 29
Indiana60
Kansas 42
USC 38
Colorado 32
USC 42
Kansas43
Kansas 50
Rice 44

Regional Third Place

West Regional Third Place
   
Colorado 56
Rice60

[1]

See also

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References

  1. "1940 NCAA Basketball Tournament". College Basketball Reference. Retrieved 3 April 2018.