The Cincinnati Bearcats men's basketball team is the NCAA Division I team representing the University of Cincinnati and they currently compete in the Big East Conference. They are one of the newest members to the Big East Conference, along with DePaul University, and they joined the Big East in 2005 after leaving Conference USA. Throughout team history, the Bearcats have had six Final Four appearances and also had back-to-back national championships making Cincinnati one of the winningest teams in NCAA Tournament history. Bearcats tickets are available anytime. Just click the ticket link above.
In their NCAA Tournament play they have recorded a 40-23 record for a .635 percentage. Over their 104 seasons as a team, Cincinnati have a 1,499-855 record, making them members of the top 30 winningest programs. They have an average of nearly 20 wins per year and the program have advanced to post-season play 32 times and won conference championships in 30 seasons. Alongside their great stats, the Bearcats greatness far exceeds simply numbers as UC is the alma mater of 29 All-America honors players, two of which continued to become Olympic Gold Medalists and become members of the Basketball Hall of Fame.
In the recent years, the Bearcats have finished in the Top 10 seven years out of the past 13 and have ranked among winningest teams in terms of both winning percentages and victories. Some extraordinary Bearcats of this era are Danny Forston, Kenyon Martin and Steve Logan who have all received first team all-conference honors, allowing the team to pick up a total of four C-USA Most Outstanding Player Awards. Other notable players that have joined the Bearcats list of All-Americans are Nick Van Exel, Ruben Patterson, Bobby Brannen, Melvin Levett, and Pete Mickeal. In the 1999-2000 season, Martin swept all of the national player of the year awards and was the top player in the college circuit. Logan was also a concurrent All-American in the 2001-02 season and reached the status of finalist for every national player of the year award.
There is further evidence of the great talent of Cincinnati players with 13 alumni Bearcats being selected in the NBA Draft and three of which were top 10 picks. One very celebrated alumni is Kenyon Martin who in 2000 was the number one pick of the entire NBA Draft and was chosen by the New Jersey Nets. Fellow teammate DerMarr Johnson was chosen in the 2000 NBA Draft as well as the number six pick and was selected by the Atlanta Hawks.
Bob Huggins, who is the current coach of the West Virginia Mountaineers was previously the head coach for the Bearcats joined the team in 1985 and left in the summer of 2005. Under the coaching of Huggins, the team compiled a 399-127 record throughout his16 years coaching Bearcats and also the team went on to play post season each of his tenure. Huggins also coached the three most achieved players of UC's recent years, Danny Forston, Kenyon Martin and Steve Logan.
