The Front Row

Ohio State has been to 11 Final Fours, that is not chopped liver.
UCLA has the most, and Kentucky is now tied in second with 15. Louisville has 9 FF's.
In the next few years if Matta gets to a few more and wins a national title or two, it would be hard to argue as a body of work in time.
Ohio State's 11 Final Four's leads the Big Ten as well.
OSU and Kentucky were the only two schools to reach the sweet 16 three years in a row, getting into round two is not as easy as most make it out to be.

I agree with this. I think we're second tier after those programs with the likes of Michigan State, Connecticut, and others. But we're definitely the best "Football First" basketball program in the country. Florida and Texas are the only ones close.

Id have to bump the likes of UConn up there just bc of their past 15 years. Id also have to look at Syracuse and Georgetown as our equals or perhaps just a small bit above us if Im being honest. The big 5 are indisputable bit I think we top Louisville. OSU is certainly top 10 overall IMO.

I love the fact that Ohio State Basketball is generating this kind of debate. Eight years ago (before Thad Matta was hired) who would have predicted we would be in this discussion now? Give Thad another eight years and I don't think anybody will be questioning whether or not we belong in that "elite" group.

They're talking about the university. Not the program. You guys are being too specific.

One thing we have in common with the big boys of college basketball. We have multiple coaches that have won.

All the big boys have that except Duke.

For the life of me, I can't figure out how UCLA stinks so bad right now.

All that tradition, good facilities, great campus, great weather and you can't crush a very weak Pac 12 right now?

These are absolutely the top six...OSU would fall in right behind these six with Louisville and Michigan State. OSU is somewhere between 7-9 Alltime in hoops programs which IMO makes them elite for sure.

OSU has the most B10 titles ( tied ) most B10 tourney titles and have been to the most Final Fours of any B10 school.

Florida had a great decade but they haven't had a long enough run to qualify as iconic in either sport. I do agree about Duke being borderline in having only done it with one coach. Syracuse is a great program but not iconic. Connecticut is getting there but we'll see what they do after Calhoun leaves, and frankly Calhoun seems awful dirty. Kentucky, Kansas ans UNC are definitely on the list. Indiana is there with multiple championships with more than one coach.

Frankly UCLA is on the list but starting to lose it's iconic status with me. Sure the success with Wooden was incomparable, but they've had one championship since he left and have been a perennial also-ran too much lately. To me iconic status means historic tournament success with a consistent high level of performance with only the occasional hiccup. UCLA hasn't had a consistent high level of performance for quite a while. It's kind of like Michigan Notre Dame claiming all those titles and wins in football when a lot of them were obtained playing dental schools and community athletic clubs.

Personally, NCAA basketball titles have more value to me from the 80's on back, when the athletes wore shorts instead of baggy capri pants and didn't have to adjust their wardrobe before every foul shot. Plus I think there needs to be a reduction in the quality of win status if too many tattoos were involved.

Completely off target but after you brought up tattoos.

How do all these kids have $1,000's of dollars on their arms? You want to talk about how tough your life was growing up, and your mom had to work 3 jobs. Then before you are even 19 you have that many tattoos.

well said agree all around with this. and oh yeah, with urban meyer as the football coach.just wow......