Jacksonville University's 1970 Final Four

Jacksonville University reached the 1970 NCAA title game by winning four straight tournament games in its first ever NCAA appearance, three of them by scoring more than 100 points.

The JU Athletics Hall of Fame entry for the 1969-70 team lists a 27-2 record, the winningest season in program history, and calls the run the program's first and only NCAA Final Four. It adds that the Dolphins played for a national championship and remain the smallest school to ever do so. NCAA.com's 1970 tournament record states that Jacksonville reached the national final in its first-ever tournament appearance, and the NCAA championship history lists the result: UCLA (28-2), coached by John Wooden, beat Jacksonville 80-69 at College Park, Maryland.

JU Athletics describes the Jacksonville team as the original "Cinderella" in NCAA Tournament history, and says the 1969-70 season stands above all others in Jacksonville Athletics history.

Coach Joe Williams and center Artis Gilmore led the 1969-70 Jacksonville Dolphins, with guard Rex Morgan as the second scorer.

A JU Athletics article from February 2020 gives Williams's Jacksonville tenure as 1964 to 1970 with a 92-61 record, and the JU Hall of Fame entry for Williams, inducted in 1994, says he built the program into a national power in six seasons, a win total third highest in Dolphin history. JU lists the leading players' 1969-70 numbers:

The JU Hall of Fame entry for Gilmore, inducted in 1993, says that as a junior he was first in the nation with a 22.2 rebounding average and 10th with a .580 field goal percentage, and that before Jacksonville he was a two-year letter winner at Gardner-Webb Junior College. The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame lists his birthplace as Chipley, Florida, and calls him a unanimous First Team All-America his junior season at Jacksonville University. JU Athletics notes that a 2020 CBS Sports Network documentary on the season, "Jacksonville U: Can Do!", highlighted the Jacksonville program's integration in 1968.

The 1969-70 Dolphins set Jacksonville University team records that, by JU Athletics' count, still stand, including 2,811 points and twenty 100-point games in a season.

The February 2020 JU Athletics article lists these Jacksonville program records from the season:

The biggest regular season night came at home in downtown Jacksonville. The JU Hall of Fame entry records the win over No. 8 Florida State on Feb. 18, 1970, in front of a capacity crowd at the Jacksonville Coliseum, and JU Athletics says that win put Jacksonville and the Dolphins on the national radar. The team finished ranked No. 4 in the final AP poll, the best end of season ranking in school history, and No. 5 in the final UPI poll.

JU's own pages count the ranked wins two ways, and both are stated here: the Hall of Fame entry says the Dolphins defeated five opponents ranked inside the Top 10, while the 2020 article counts five wins against nationally ranked Top 15 opponents, four of which came in succession on the road to the Final Four and the title game.

Jacksonville won the 1970 Mideast Region by beating Western Kentucky, Iowa by one point and No. 1 Kentucky, according to NCAA.com's tournament record.

NCAA.com lists every Jacksonville game of the 1970 tournament:

The JU Hall of Fame entry calls Kentucky the No. 1 team in the nation and St. Bonaventure No. 3. In the same Mideast Region, Kentucky had reached the regional final by beating Notre Dame 109-99, and Iowa took third place by beating Notre Dame 121-106, NCAA.com records. The 1970 Regional Champion and Runner-Up trophies are on display in the lobby of Historic Swisher Gymnasium on the Jacksonville University campus, JU Athletics says.

At the 1970 Final Four in College Park, Maryland, Jacksonville beat St. Bonaventure 91-83 and then lost the title game to UCLA 80-69.

JU Athletics states that St. Bonaventure and New Mexico State joined UCLA and Jacksonville at Cole Field House, and that the 1970 Final Four remains the only one to feature three programs later commonly referred to as mid-majors. NCAA.com's tournament record adds that UCLA had become the first school to win three consecutive national championships in 1969, that the 1970 title was its sixth in as many trips to the title game, and that UCLA's Sidney Wicks posted a double-double in the final and was the tournament's Most Outstanding Player. New Mexico State beat St. Bonaventure 79-73 in the third-place game.

Gilmore led the whole 1970 tournament in rebounding, at 18.6 a game over five games, by NCAA.com's tournament leaders list, the same list that shows Notre Dame's Austin Carr leading in scoring at 52.7 points over three games. The title game loss left Jacksonville at the 27-2 record JU lists, while the NCAA championship history gives UCLA's final record as 28-2.

Jacksonville University made the 1969-70 squad the first team fully inducted into the Jacksonville Athletics Hall of Fame, on Oct. 19, 2019.

JU Athletics states that the roster already counted five Hall of Fame players, including Naismith Hall of Famer Artis Gilmore, and that Williams and assistant coach Tom Wasdin were earlier inductees. For the 50th anniversary, on Feb. 20, 2020, the Jacksonville men's team wore tribute jerseys inside Swisher Gymnasium against Lipscomb, a date picked to match the Feb. 18, 1970, Florida State upset. CBS Sports Network premiered the one-hour documentary on Feb. 9, 2020, which JU says explores how the Dolphins helped unite a city still dealing with racial unrest.

Gilmore's professional career is told two ways by two halls: the Naismith Hall, which enshrined him in 2011, says it lasted 17 seasons, while JU's Hall of Fame entry calls it an 18-year career in the ABA and NBA. JU records that the Kentucky Colonels made him the first pick of the 1971 ABA draft, that he finished at Jacksonville with 1,312 points and 1,224 rebounds, and that his #53 jersey is retired at both Jacksonville University and Gardner-Webb. The Naismith Hall states that his career average of 22.7 rebounds per game is an NCAA record.

Jacksonville University still plays basketball in Swisher Gymnasium, the 1953 campus gym where the 1970 regional trophies are displayed.

The JU Athletics facility page lists Swisher Gymnasium as built in 1953, with seating for 1,386 and a 7,354 square foot court, and as the home of the Jacksonville University men's and women's basketball and volleyball teams. Recent work includes new videoboards, an updated game floor, basketball locker room renovations in 2023 and a volleyball locker room in 2024. The gym has also hosted concerts by Billy Joel in 1975 and K.C. and the Sunshine Band in 1979, and the men's team put together a 22-game home winning streak across the 2021-22 and 2022-23 seasons.

The University of North Florida's George Lansing Taylor collection keeps a photograph of Swisher Gym Jacksonville University dated April 4, 2010, among its Jacksonville architecture images. Last verified: October 18, 2026, against JU Athletics' Hall of Fame, news and facility pages, NCAA.com's championship history and 1970 tournament record, the Naismith Hall's Gilmore entry and the UNF Digital Commons record.