When it comes to identifying the teams that belong in the who's who of men's division I golf, there traditionally is no need to look beyond the major conferences. In the past ten years, the Big Twelve, Pacific Ten, and Southeastern Conferences have each had associated teams go on to win NCAA championships three times; the remaining championship was won by Minnesota (Big Ten) in 2002.
Once again, the top-ranked teams generally represent these aforementioned conferences. However, there are a few highly-ranked programs that may buck the trend, and have a strong chance to bring home the hardware for conferences that have experienced little success in terms of winning NCAA men's division I championship titles in recent history. The following is a list of the top ten teams and their respective conferences according to the most current Golfweek/Sagarin Rating:
- Oklahoma State (Big Twelve)
- Stanford (Pac Ten)
- Florida (SEC)
- TCU (Mountain West)
- Florida State (SEC)
- Texas A&M (Big Twelve)
- Arizona State (Pacific Ten)
- Washington (Atlantic Ten)
- Augusta State (Peach Belt)
- Illinois (Big Ten)
In the past twenty years, teams from the Big Twelve, Pacific Ten, or the Southeastern Conference have won the NCAA Division I Men's Championship seventeen times. Besides Minnesota (Big Ten), UNLV (Mountain West) and Pepperdine (West Coast) were the only other teams to win championships.
Based on their dominating performances this past fall season, the teams from Oklahoma State and Stanford will be extremely hard to beat come this spring. Still, teams from TCU, Washington, and Augusta State do boast a great deal of talent that could surprise many people by winning the title in June.
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