Biggest Winners and Losers of the 2021 NCAA Tournament
By Matt Melton
Winner – UCLA Bruins
From the First Four to the Final Four, what a run it was for the UCLA Bruins.
After UCLA edged out Michigan State 86-80 in their First Four game, the Bruins then pulled off three massive upsets in the next four rounds over BYU, Alabama, and Michigan to reach their first Final Four since the 2007-2008 season. Arguably no one outside of the UCLA faithful saw this run coming, and if you say you did, you’re probably lying.
While this was arguably the “Cinderella” run of the 2021 NCAA Tournament, this was also a “coming out party” for some of the Bruins stars, in particular Johnny Juzang. Juzang transferred to UCLA after spending his freshman season a year ago at Kentucky, and not only did he improve vastly from year to year, but showed everyone this past March.
Juzang took over at times for the Bruins scoring 20+ points in four of their six NCAA Tournament games. To put things in perspective on just how good Juzang was, he shot over 40+% from two and 30+% from three in all but one of those six games, their Sweet 16 win over Alabama in a game in which he fouled out. For the tournament, Juzang shot 50.9% from two, 37.5% from three, and 77.8% from the free-throw line.
It wasn’t just Juzang however as the Bruins got outstanding contributions from numerous players including Jaime Jaquez, Tyger Campbell, Cody Riley, and more. UCLA was extremely close to reaching the national title game, and if it wasn’t for the Jalen Suggs buzzer-beater, who knows what happens?
This was a historic run for the UCLA Bruins as they became the first team since VCU in 2011 to go from the First Four to the Final Four. Was this just an example of a team getting hot at the right time, or are the Bruins a legit title contender going forward?