The 10 College Basketball Teams With The Most Sweet Sixteen Appearances

There’s still plenty of work to be done in the quest for a national championship if you manage to make it through the first two rounds of the NCAA Tournament, but you’re doing something right if you end up in the Sweet Sixteen.

The 64 teams that earn a spot in the NCAA Tournament (excluding those that competed in the First Four) need to string together six wins in a row if they want to win a national title, and the ones that make it through the first couple of rounds get a few days to prepare for the Sweet Sixteen.

At the end of the day, a Sweet Sixteen appearance doesn’t mean that much if you’re not able to walk away with a championship when everything is said and done.

With that said, racking up a number of appearances in that round is a sign your school knows a thing or two about fostering a solid basketball program—which is certainly the case for the ones on this list.

Kentucky: 45

The Sweet Sixteen became A Thing for the first time in 1951—although it’s worth noting it was also the first round during the first year the tournament expanded to 16 teams—and no school has gotten there more often than Kentucky.

The Wildcats won their third of the eight championships they’ve secured since the advent of the NCAA Tournament that season,  and they’re also the only team that’s made it there more often than not since its inception.

They’ve put together a number of streaks over the decades, but none top the run of five consecutive Sweet Sixteen appearances between 1995 and 1999 (two of those runs ended with a title).

North Carolina: 36

It’ll likely be a pretty long time before Kentucky loses the crown based on the lead it has over the two teams who are currently tied for the silver medal.

The first is UNC, which got its first Sweet Sixteen appearance and first national championship in 1957.

The Tar Heels get a boost from the 13-year streak that began in 1981 under Dean Smith (the second-longest in history behind the school we’ll get to in a second), who led North Carolina to a title the following year and capped it off with another in 1993.

UCLA: 36

UCLA holds the record for the most consecutive Sweet Sixteen appearances at 14, but it would be a staggering 19 if not for the NCAA rule that once prevented freshmen from playing varsity basketball.

The Golden Bears didn’t receive an invite in 1966 after going 18-8 in the wake of back-to-back championships under John Wooden, but they were also unable to harness the talents of a freshman phenom named Lew Alcindor—the player most people know better as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

They returned with a vengeance the following year en route to winning seven titles in a row and kickstarting the aforementioned streak that came to an end when they were eliminated in the second round in 1981.

Duke: 34

You had to know it was only a matter of time until Duke showed up here, and based on recent history, it’s not a stretch to suggest they could end up leapfrogging UNC and UCLA in the near future due to how things have been trending.

The Blue Devils ended up in the Sweet Sixteen for the first time in 1960 and had a handful of appearances over the next couple of decades until they ascended to a new level once Mike Krzyzewski took the reins in Durham.

Coach K got his first Sweet Sixteen during the run that saw Duke to to Louisville in the national championship game in 1986, and he oversaw the nine-year streak that unfolded between 1998 and 2006 and yielded a championship in 2001.

Kansas: 31

You also had to know Kansas was going to be showing up here pretty soon, and the Jayhawks are currently fifth in the Sweet Sixteen rankings.

The team’s reputation as a blue blood comes from decades of fairly sustained success that began when Kansas got its first Sweet Sixteen before winning a championship in 1952.

The Jayhawks have maxed out at five seasons when it comes to consecutive appearances, but they’ve managed to get at least a couple of Sweet Sixteens out of every single coach they’ve had since their first one—none of whom has more than the 11 Bill Self currently boasts.

Louisville: 24

Louisville’s appearance on this list is somewhat bittersweet when you consider the Cardinals only have two NCAA-recognized titles in their history despite making it to the Sweet Sixteen on two dozen occasions (excluding vacated runs in 2012, 2013, and 2014).

Louisville was in the very first Sweet Sixteen in 1951 and had a few more appearances over the next couple of decades before taking a huge leap forward after Denny Crum led them to the Final Four during his first season in 1972.

Crum ended up with 14 Sweet Sixteens under his belt by the time he left in 1995 and was also the man who helped the Cardinals—who are in the midst of an unprecedented Sweet Sixteen drought—win its only (non-vacated) championships.

Syracuse: 24

Syracuse got its first Sweet Sixteen in 1958 during a run to the Elite Eight and also had a handful of others over the next 20 years or so before a savior arrived in the form of Jim Boeheim.

The legendary coach made it to the Sweet Sixteen during his first season in 1977 and had made it at least that far 20 times when his reign came to an end in 2023.

Indiana: 22

Indiana had its first Sweet Sixteen in 1953 while winning a title and finished the decade with three of them before adding a fourth in 1967.

As you can probably guess, Bobby Knight was responsible for more than any other coach with 14, but Tom Crean was also able to get three of them—including the most recent appearance for the Hoosiers in 2016.

Michigan State: 22

Michigan State’s first Sweet Sixteen came in 1957 (a trip to the Final Four), and it had six of them by the time Tom Izzo took over in 1996.

That marked the start of a new era that saw the Spartans win their first national championship in more than two decades in 2000, and if you’re capable of doing some incredibly elementary math, you’ll be able to figure out Izzo has made it to the Sweet Sixteen a sweet 16 times after notching another tally this season.

Arizona: 21

Arizona was a member of the first-ever Sweet Sixteen but needed to wait another 25 years to get its second and didn’t really turn the corner until Lute Olson was hired in 1984.

He got his first four years later during a run that ended in the Final Four and ended up with 11 before leaving in 2011 prior to Sean Miller picking up the torch and adding another five to the total (which now sits at 21 now that Tommy Lloyd has gotten there in three of his first four years with the Wildcats).