1939 NCAA basketball tournament
| Teams | 8 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Finals site | Patten Gymnasium, Evanston, Illinois | ||||
| Champions | Oregon Webfoots (1st title, 1st title game, 1st Final Four) | ||||
| Runner-up | Ohio State Buckeyes (1st title game, 1st Final Four) | ||||
| Semifinalists |
| ||||
| Winning coach | Howard Hobson (1st title) | ||||
| MOP | Jimmy Hull, (Ohio State) | ||||
| Attendance | 15,025 | ||||
| Top scorer | Jimmy Hull, (Ohio State) (58 points) | ||||
| |||||
The 1939 NCAA basketball tournament involved eight schools playing in single-elimination play to determine the NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship. It was the first NCAA basketball national championship tournament, although it was operated by the National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) at the time.
The tournament began on March 17 and ended with the championship game on March 27 on Northwestern University's campus in Evanston, Illinois.[1][2][3][4] A total of eight games were played, including a single third-place game in the West region. The East region did not hold a third-place game until 1941, and there was no national third-place game until 1946.
Oregon, coached by Howard Hobson, won the national title with a 46–33 victory in the final game over Ohio State, coached by Harold Olsen. Jimmy Hull of Ohio State was named the tournament's Most Outstanding Player.
Despite its success in this first tournament, Oregon would not make another Final Four until 2017.
Tournament procedure
One team would represent each of the NCAA's eight geographic districts for a total of eight teams. Each district had a selection committee which determined their representative; one district elected to hold a playoff to determine the bid. In the bracket, the four eastern districts met for the East Regional, and the four western districts met for the West Regional; the champions of each region met in Evanston, Illinois for the championship game.
1939 NCAA tournament schedule and venues
The following are the sites selected to host each round of the 1939 tournament:
Regionals
- March 17 and 18
- East Regional, The Palestra, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
- March 20 and 21
- West Regional, California Coliseum, San Francisco, California
Championship Game
- March 30
- Patten Gymnasium, Evanston, Illinois
Selection of teams
District decisions
District selection committees decided upon their representative, with most analyzing the top teams and selecting one.[5] Districts 2, 6, and 8 invited Villanova, Texas, and Oregon, respectively, who accepted their invitations. Other districts had their first choice decline the invitation. District 1 initially selected Dartmouth, the Eastern Intercollegiate Basketball League champion, but they declined the invitation and the committee subsequently invited independent Brown. District 3 selected Southern Conference champion Wake Forest over Southern Conference tournament champion Clemson and Southeastern Conference tournament champion Kentucky. District 4 selected independent Bradley, but they elected to participate in the National Invitation Tournament instead; the committee then invited their second-best team, Ohio State, the Big Ten champion. District 7 selected Colorado, the champion of the Mountain States Conference but they declined the invitation due to not wanting to travel again after a mid-season trip to New York City. Utah State was instead invited to represent District 7.[6]
District 5 playoff
One district, District 5, decided to host a four-team playoff in Oklahoma City to determine which team would represent them in the tournament. The committee invited Missouri and Oklahoma from the Big 6 Conference and Oklahoma A&M and Drake from the Missouri Valley Conference. However, Missouri declined the invitation to the playoff. Oklahoma A&M defeated Drake in the first round of the playoffs, and Oklahoma won the second game against A&M to advance to the tournament.[7]
| First Round March 13 | Second Round March 14 | ||||||
| Oklahoma | 30 | ||||||
| Oklahoma A&M | 23 | Oklahoma A&M | 21 | ||||
| Drake | 22 | ||||||
Tournament teams
| School | Coach | Conference | NCAA District | Record |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brown | Eck Allen | Independent | District 1 | 16–3 |
| Ohio State | Harold Olsen | Big Ten | District 4 | 14–6 |
| Villanova | Alex Severance | Independent | District 2 | 19–4 |
| Wake Forest | Murray Greason | Southern | District 3 | 18–5 |
| School | Coach | Conference | NCAA District | Record |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oklahoma | Bruce Drake | Big Six | District 5 | 11–8 |
| Oregon | Howard Hobson | Pacific Coast | District 8 | 26–5 |
| Texas | Jack Gray | Southwest | District 6 | 19–4 |
| Utah State | Dick Romney | Mountain States | District 7 | 16–6 |
Bracket
| Regional Semifinals | Regional Finals | National Championship | |||||||||||
| March 17 | |||||||||||||
| Villanova | 42 | ||||||||||||
| March 18 | |||||||||||||
| Brown | 30 | ||||||||||||
| Villanova | 36 | ||||||||||||
| East – Philadelphia | |||||||||||||
| Ohio State | 53 | ||||||||||||
| Ohio State | 64 | ||||||||||||
| Evanston, Illinois – March 27 | |||||||||||||
| Wake Forest | 52 | ||||||||||||
| Ohio State | 33 | ||||||||||||
| March 20 | |||||||||||||
| Oregon | 46 | ||||||||||||
| Oregon | 56 | ||||||||||||
| March 21 | |||||||||||||
| Texas | 41 | ||||||||||||
| Oregon | 55 | ||||||||||||
| West – San Francisco | |||||||||||||
| Oklahoma | 37 | ||||||||||||
| Utah State | 39 | ||||||||||||
| Oklahoma | 50 | ||||||||||||
| West Third Place Game | |||||||||||||
| March 21 | |||||||||||||
| Texas | 49 | ||||||||||||
| Utah State | 51 | ||||||||||||
See also
References
- ^ "Giant Oregon five defeats Ohio for U.S. title, 46–33". Milwaukee Sentinel. Associated Press. March 28, 1939. p. 12.
- ^ Kuechle, Oliver (March 28, 1939). "Oregon beats Ohio State easily for national title". Milwaukee Journal. p. 12, part 2.
- ^ "Oregon tops Bucks, 46–33". Toledo Blade. Ohio. United Press. March 28, 1939. p. 11.
- ^ Strite, Dick (March 28, 1939). "Mighty Oregons scramble Ohio State to take hoop title of all America". Eugene Register-Guard. Oregon. p. 1.
- ^ Carlson, Chad (2017). Making March Madness: The Early Years of the NCAA, NIT, and College Basketball Championships, 1922-1951. Sport, Culture, and Society. Chicago: University of Arkansas Press. p. 76. ISBN 978-1-61075-615-0.
- ^ Carlson, Chad (2017). Making March Madness: The Early Years of the NCAA, NIT, and College Basketball Championships 1922-1951. Sport, cuture & society. National Collegiate Athletic Association. Fayetteville: The University of Arkansas Press. pp. 83–84. ISBN 978-1-68226-033-3. OCLC 979568567.
- ^ Carlson, Chad (2017). Making March Madness: The Early Years of the NCAA, NIT, and College Basketball Championships, 1922-1951. Sport, Culture, and Society. Chicago: University of Arkansas Press. p. 84. ISBN 978-1-68226-033-3.
- ^ "Oklahoma State University Athletics". Oklahoma State University Athletics. Retrieved April 8, 2025.
- ^ "1939 NCAA basketball tournament". College Basketball Reference. Retrieved April 3, 2018.
