Entering Friday, teams ranked No. 15 in the NCAA tournament held an 8-132 record in first-round games. The upsets are threaded through tournament lore, from Richmond stunning Syracuse in 1991 to Lehigh upsetting Duke in 2012 to the magical Dunk City run of Florida Gulf Coast after it soared past Georgetown in 2013.
The allure of the No. 15 upset is that it’s rare but still attainable, a more realistic version than the moonshot No. 16 over No. 1, which has happened only once.
As the NCAA men's tournament returned this week with a blunt-force reintroduction of the event’s eternal charm, No.