Cinderella may not be dead, but it certainly seems as though she’s grown tired of dancing with Prince Charming and has taken the year off. This is the first NCAA Tournament since 2007 with no teams seeded 11 or higher in the Sweet 16, and the first time that the Regional Semifinals feature teams from just four conferences.
While this March Madness doesn’t have the mid-major flare that we love, the chalky first rounds have provided a loaded Sweet 16 with plenty of big brands, highly-seeded teams, and legendary coaches. At this point in the tournament, experience matters, and the four coaches still left in the first with 20+ NCAA Tournament appearances have plenty of it. Even the highest-seeded team left is a threat with its head coach’s lofty resume.
No coach left in the field has more NCAA Tournament wins than Arkansas head coach John Calipari. The 2012 national champion has been to six Final Fours across his 24 tournament appearances and has taken three different programs to the Final Four. Now, after upsetting his longtime rival Rick Pitino and his No. 2 seed St. John’s Red Storm in the second round, Coach Cal with his 59-career tournament wins, gets a matchup with Texas Tech and Grant McCasland, who has two of his three career tournament wins this postseason.
While Rick Barnes leads this group with 29 NCAA Tournament appearances, Tom Izzo is second in wins with 58 over his 27 trips to The Big Dance. For all the postseason success and two national champions in the group (Calipari and Izzo), Houston head coach Kelvin Sampson has the longest active streak of Sweet 16 appearances, extending it to six while snapping Mark Few’s streak at eight with a second-round win over Gonzaga on Saturday.
If you want to know which head coaches to trust in the Sweet 16, whether you’re fixing up a redemption bracket, betting game-by-game, or just want another reason to believe in your team, here are the 16 remaining coaches in the 2025 Sweet 16 ranked by total NCAA Tournament wins.