NCAA Basketball: Top 10 teams Bob Knight has ever coached

6. 1973 Indiana (22-6)

Knight accepted the head coaching job at Indiana in 1971, but by his second year the Hoosiers already had something special brewing. They had a pair of veteran frontcourt pieces, as Steve Downing averaged 20.1 points and 10.6 rebounds in his senior season while John Ritter was good for 15 points a game as well. Knight had brought in plenty of young talent as well, as Quinn Buckner, Steve Green, and John Laskowski each average double figures as well.

Unranked before the season, the Hoosiers got themselves into the polls by winning their first five games, including at Kansas and a tough battle against Kentucky. They would drop a few games before a solid run to start conference play. Indiana won their first six Big Ten contests before a rough stretch in early February including a few close road losses. By the end of the season, the Hoosiers had earned their first regular season title in six years and became Knight’s first team to make the Big Dance.

While it certainly wasn’t expected for Indiana to reach the Big Dance, the Hoosiers winning three games once they got there was just as surprising. The Hoosiers defeated Marquette by six and Kentucky by seven to give Knight his first trip to the Final Four. While future champion UCLA would beat Indiana by double-digits in that Final Four game, they would salvage the 3rd place game, getting a 97-79 victory over Providence, with 21-point games for both Downing and Ritter to end their careers.