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John Wooden's 1972 UCLA Bruins top list of past NCAA champions

If you want to start an argument, try ranking teams that by definition are all distinguished by excellence. These are all national champions, so the "worst" team here was better than any opponent it faced in its NCAA tournament.

Nevertheless, here we are. You'll notice right away that the 1960s and 1970s show up well on this list, and it's not by accident.

That era marked the point at which two important procedural lines intersected. On the one hand, identifying the best talent coming out of high school had become a routinized and relatively efficient process by the middle of the 20th century.