The 1946 NCAA basketball tournament involved eight schools playing in

single-elimination A single-elimination knockout, or sudden-death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of a match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final match-up, w ...

play to determine the national champion of men's

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Division I

college basketball College basketball is basketball that is played by teams of Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. In the Higher education in the United States, United States, colleges and universities are governed by collegiate athle ...

. It began on March 21, 1946, and ended with the

championship game A champion (from the late Latin ''campio'') is the victor in a challenge, contest or competition. There can be a territorial pyramid of championships, e.g. local, regional/provincial/state, national, continental and world championships, and ...

on March 26 in

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. A total of 10 games were played, including a third-place game in each region and a national third-place game.

Oklahoma A&M Oklahoma State University (informally Oklahoma State or OSU) is a public land-grant research university in Stillwater, Oklahoma, United States. The university was established in 1890 under the legislation of the Morrill Act. Originally known as ...

, coached by

Henry Iba Henry Payne “Hank” Iba (; August 6, 1904 – January 15, 1993) was an American basketball coach and college athletics administrator. He served as the head basketball coach at Northwest Missouri State Teacher's College, now known as Northwes ...

, won the national title with a 43–40 victory in the final game over

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, coached by

Ben Carnevale Bernard Louis Carnevale (October 30, 1915 – March 25, 2008) was an American basketball coach and college athletic administrator. He served as the head basketball coach at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill from 1944 to 1946 and th ...

Bob Kurland Robert Albert Kurland (December 23, 1924 – September 29, 2013) was an American basketball center, who played for the two-time NCAA champion Oklahoma A&M Aggies (now Oklahoma State Cowboys). Standing tall, he has been credited as the first pe ...

was named the tournament's Most Outstanding Player. The Aggies were the first team to win a second NCAA championship, the first to repeat as champions, and the first of two teams (

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being the other) to win the title in their first two NCAA appearances. This was the first tournament to have four teams advance to the final site, though not the first to have a true "Final Four" format (that would not occur until

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). The two regional losers played in the national third-place game, while the two winners played for the championship. The third-place game would continue through the 1981 tournament.

Locations

The following were the sites which hosted each round of the 1946 tournament:

Regionals

;March 21 and 23 :East Regional,

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(Host:

Metropolitan New York Conference Membership Regular season champions Men's basketball *1934 *1935 DNP *1936 *1937 *1938 *1939 Long Island Long Island is a densely populated continental island in southeastern New York (state), New York state, extending into ...

) ;March 22 and 23 :West Regional, Municipal Auditorium,

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(Host:

Missouri Valley Conference The Missouri Valley Conference (also called MVC or simply "The Valley") is the fourth-oldest collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. The conference's members are primarily located in the Midwestern Unite ...

)

Championship Game

;March 26: :

(Host: Metropolitan New York Conference)

Teams

Bracket

* – Denotes overtime period

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:1946 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament

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 concen ...