The 1945 NAIA basketball tournament was held in March at
Municipal Auditorium in
Kansas City, Missouri. The 8th annual
NAIA basketball tournament featured 16 teams playing in a single-elimination format, instead of the normal 32. It is the only tournament to feature only 16 teams.
The NAIA semifinals featured four new teams for the first time since the inaugural year,
1937. The championship game featured
Loyola New Orleans defeating
Pepperdine
Pepperdine University () is a private research university affiliated with the Churches of Christ with its main campus in Los Angeles County, California. Pepperdine's main campus consists of 830 acres (340 ha) overlooking the Pacific Ocean and ...
49–35.
Awards and honors
Many of the records set by the 1945 tournament have been broken, and many of the awards were established much later:
*Leading scorer est. 1963
*Leading rebounder est. 1963
*Charles Stevenson Hustle Award est. 1958
*Coach of the Year est. 1954
*Player of the Year est. 1994
NAIA Championship History
Bracket
* * denotes overtime.
See also
* 1945 NCAA basketball tournament
The 1945 NCAA basketball tournament was an eight-team single-elimination tournament to determine the national champion of men's National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) college basketball. It began on March 22, 1945, and ended with the ch ...
* 1945 National Invitation Tournament
The 1945 National Invitation Tournament was the 1945 edition of the annual NCAA college basketball competition.
Selected teams
Below is a list of the eight teams selected for the tournament.
References
{{NAIA men's basketball tournament
NAIA Men's Basketball Championship
Tournament
A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses:
# One or more competitions held at a single venue and concentr ...
1945 in sports in Missouri