How Long Is The Road to the Final Four For All 68 Teams?

We’ve heard it before: The Road to the Final Four is long and painful.  But exactly how long is it?  For some of the teams, it seems like they always get opening round games right down the road¹.  For the rest of us, it seems like our team has to cross nine time zones to even get to the Sweet 16. Well, I did the work so you didn’t have to. Using some base assumptions, I plugged in the numbers to see who, exactly, has the longest way still to go.  The answer will surprise you.

Assumptions:

1. During the NCAA tournament, the NCAA itself charters aircraft to bring teams to games. I assume that they generally use the closest reasonable airport. In major metro areas I tend to use the “major” airport, but I realize that Temple may fly out of Northeast Philadelphia instead of Philadelphia International Airport, the numbers do not materially change.  I promise, I tested.  When I did this for the upcoming Major League Baseball season, people got really mad about this. I re-ran the numbers and they changed by less than .01%, so settle down.
2. I assume that teams don’t go home after winning, they just move on to the next site.  I’m sure this is a function of distance, where Hawaii certainly will stay on the mainland for as long as they’re still in it, but where does one draw the “return-home” threshold? I don’t know. So to treat everyone fairly, I will just assume they just keep moving.
3. Since this is mileage TO the Final Four, I don’t consider a trip home. That would be some different article that’s less interesting.

Okay, enough assumptions!

Results:

In total, all 68 teams would travel 195,734 miles should they all decide to meet in Houston and watch each other, and it would look like this:

Unfortunately for 64, that’s not how it will work. Here are some individual statistics:

Longest overall journey to the Final Four: Baylor, who has to go 5,504 miles, from Waco to Providence, then across the country to Anaheim, and then back to only 200 miles from home: Houston. That’s 110 miles farther than Hawaii would have to travel.  Think about that for a minute. Here’s the map:

Shortest overall journey to the Final Four: Kansas, who has only 1,461 miles to travel. From Lawrence to Des Moines, Louisville, and then Houston. That’s a mere 26.5% of the travel that fellow Big 12 member Baylor will have, should they meet up in Houston.  This journey looks a lot less challenging:

Longest journey to the Final Four for a 1 seed: Oregon, who at 2,674 miles, will travel almost a thousand miles farther than the next closest 1 seed (UVA).

Shortest journey to the Final Four for a 16 seed: Hampton, 1,725 miles. Don’t worry, it won’t happen.

Average journey by region: West (3,835), South (2,705), East (2,637), Midwest (2,317).

Seed with shortest average journey: One seed, with an average of 1,881 miles.  Seems fair.

Seed with longest average journey: 13. Thanks, Hawaii!

Here’s the raw data so you can see how your team stacks up…

Full results by team:

1. Duke or UNC, take your pick