UMBC made history in 2018, becoming the first No. 16 seed in the history of the men’s NCAA tournament to beat a No. 1 seed, with its dominant 74–54 blowout of Virginia. On Friday, a second men’s team joined the exclusive club of No. 16 seeds to win an NCAA tournament game, with 2018 UMBC and 1998 Harvard women’s basketball: Fairleigh Dickinson.
The Knights stunned No. 1 seed Purdue, 63–58, to make history in Columbus. The feat is made even more miraculous by the fact that under normal circumstances, FDU wouldn’t have been in the Big Dance at all. The team only qualified because NEC tournament champion Merrimack—which beat FDU in the conference title game—was not eligible while in its four-year transitionary period from Division II to Division I.
As the game unfolded, no program seemed happier for Fairleigh Dickinson than UMBC, whose always-entertaining Twitter account was in peak form.
