2003 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament

2003 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament
2003 Final Four logo
Season	2002–03
Teams	65
Finals site	Louisiana Superdome New Orleans, Louisiana
Champions	Syracuse (1st title, 3rd title game, 4th Final Four)
Runner-up	Kansas (7th title game, 12th Final Four)
Semifinalists	Marquette (3rd Final Four) Texas (3rd Final Four)
Winning coach	Jim Boeheim (1st title)
MOP	Carmelo Anthony Syracuse
Attendance	715,080
Top scorer	Carmelo Anthony Syracuse (21 points)
NCAA Men's Division I Tournaments «2002  2004»

The 2003 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament involved 65 schools playing in single-elimination play to determine the national champion of men's NCAA Division I college basketball. It began on March 18, 2003, and ended with the championship game on April 7 in New Orleans, Louisiana. A total of 64 games were played. Syracuse University, coached by Jim Boeheim, earned a 81-78 victory in the final game over Kansas, coached by Roy Williams. Carmelo Anthony of Syracuse was named the tournament's Most Outstanding Player. Syracuse beat four Big 12 teams on its way to the title: Oklahoma State, Oklahoma, Texas and Kansas. Those victories helped earn Boeheim the national title that had eluded him in 1987 and 1996.

Locations

The 2003 play-in game was played on Tuesday, March 18, at the University of Dayton Arena in Dayton, Ohio, as it had been since its inception in 2001.

The first and second-round games were played at the following sites:

March 20 and 22

Ford Center, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma (Host: Big 12 Conference)

Jon M. Huntsman Center, Salt Lake City, Utah (Host: University of Utah)

RCA Dome, Indianapolis, Indiana (Hosts: Butler University and Horizon League)

Spokane Veterans Memorial Arena, Spokane Arena (Host: Washington State University)

March 21 and 23

Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Center, Birmingham, Alabama (Host: Southeastern Conference)

FleetCenter, Boston, Massachusetts (Host: Boston College)

Gaylord Entertainment Center, Nashville, Tennessee (Host: Vanderbilt University)

St. Pete Times Forum, Tampa, Florida (Host: University of South Florida)

The regional final sites were:

March 27 and 29

Midwest Regional, Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, Minneapolis, Minnesota (Host: University of Minnesota)

West Regional, Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim, Anaheim, California (Host: Big West Conference)

March 28 and 30

East Regional, Pepsi Arena, Albany, New York (Host: Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference and Siena College)

South Regional, Alamodome, San Antonio, Texas (Host: University of Texas at San Antonio)

Each regional winner advanced to the Final Four at the Louisiana Superdome, New Orleans, Louisiana, hosted by the Sun Belt Conference and the University of New Orleans. The semi-final games were held on April 5 and the final on April 7, 2003.

Qualifying teams

Bids by conference

Final four

The Louisiana Superdome was host of the Final Four and National Championship in 2003.

At Louisiana Superdome, New Orleans

National Semifinals

• April 5, 2003
  • Syracuse (E3) 95, Texas (S1) 84

  Freshman Carmelo Anthony scored 33 points leading the Syracuse Orangemen past the Texas Longhorns in the night cap of the National Semifinal doubleheader. Syracuse opened up a comfortable 2nd half lead, but that was trimmed to four with just 1:08 remaining. However, freshman Gerry McNamara iced the game with clutch foul shooting in the final minutes. The win put Syracuse and coach Jim Boeheim one win away from their first ever National Championship. Texas was the last number one seed remaining in the tournament.^[1]

• • Kansas (W2) 94, Marquette (M3) 61

  It was as if only three teams had advanced to the Final Four as the Kansas Jayhawks routed the Marquette Golden Eagles by 33 points, the fourth largest blowout in Final Four history. Keith Langford led the Jayhawks with 24 points, and Kirk Hinrich and Aaron Miles each added 18 points. Like Boeheim, Kansas coach Roy Williams was just one win away from winning his first ever National Championship.^[2]

Championship Game

• April 7, 2003
  • Syracuse (E3) 81, Kansas (W2) 78

  This battle was described as which future Hall of Fame coach would win his first ever national title. Jim Boeheim was in his 27th season as Syracuse head coach, and Roy Williams was in his fifteenth season as Kansas head coach. Both had been disappointed with previous championship game losses (Boeheim: 1987, 1996 Williams: 1991). Syracuse dominated with a hot shooting first half to lead by 11 at the break. Gerry McNamara connected on an impressive six three-pointers in the half, which were his 18 points for the game. Kansas fought back to within 80-78 in the final minute and had a chance to tie after Hakim Warrick missed a pair of free throws in the final moments. Warrick would more than atone for his missed foul shots as he came out of nowhere to block Michael Lee's three point attempt with 0.7 on the game clock. After Kirk Hinrich's three-pointer at the buzzer went over the net, Syracuse's victory gave them their first ever national championship, and coach Jim Boeheim the championship he had been chasing all his years at Syracuse. Carmelo Anthony was named Most Outstanding Player (MOP) with 20 points in the win. Syracuse also avenged a second-round loss to Kansas two years earlier.^[3]

Bracket

East Regional — Albany, New York

South Regional — San Antonio, Texas

Midwest Regional — Minneapolis, Minnesota

West Regional — Anaheim, California

Final Four — New Orleans, Louisiana

Broadcast information

Originally, CBS Sports was to have shown all 63 games of the tournament following the opening round, which was on ESPN. However, because of the start of the Iraq war, CBS moved its telecasts of the games played on the first Thursday afternoon of the tournament to ESPN, opting to join other broadcast and non-broadcast outlets in showing extended news coverage.

By Thursday night, coverage had returned to CBS, albeit with frequent news updates. To make up for lost advertising revenue, an additional time slot was opened the following Sunday evening for more CBS telecasts.

Also, Mega March Madness was launched as an exclusive feature on DirecTV. This allowed for additional game broadcasts of the first three rounds other than those assigned to a viewer's home market.

Westwood One had exclusive national radio coverage.

CBS Sports announcers

• Jim Nantz/Billy Packer/Bonnie Bernstein
• Dick Enberg/Matt Guokas/Kareem Abdul-Jabbar/Armen Keteyian
• Verne Lundquist and Bill Raftery
• Gus Johnson and Len Elmore
• Kevin Harlan and Jay Bilas
• Ian Eagle and Jim Spanarkel
• Craig Bolerjack and Dan Bonner
• Tim Brando and Bob Wenzel

See also

• 2003 NAIA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament

References