Davidson Wildcats

Davidson basketball punches far above the size of its small liberal-arts campus outside Charlotte, North Carolina, playing in the intimate confines of John M. Belk Arena. The Wildcats have built a national reputation as a program capable of beating anyone, thanks in large part to producing one of the greatest shooters the sport has ever seen. Davidson's culture blends academic rigor with a fiercely competitive, disciplined style of play under longtime coach Bob McKillop. It's a program where mid-major grit regularly translates into major upsets on the national stage.

Davidson's signature moment came in 2008, when a sophomore named Stephen Curry erupted for 40, 30, and 33 points in successive tournament wins over Gonzaga, Georgetown, and Wisconsin, carrying the tenth-seeded Wildcats to the Elite Eight before a narrow loss to eventual champion Kansas. That run reestablished Davidson's national profile decades after the program's first Elite Eight trip in 1969 under coach Lefty Driesell. Curry's breakout tournament launched him toward a Hall of Fame NBA career and remains the defining story in Davidson basketball history. The Wildcats have never won a national championship but are remembered as one of March's great mid-major stories.