Cal Poly Mustangs men's basketball
The Cal Poly Mustangs men's basketball team represents California Polytechnic State University, located in San Luis Obispo, California. The school's team currently competes in the Big West Conference. The Cal Poly men's basketball team's first season was 1907 and its first season as a four-year institution was 1941–42. The Mustangs are coached by Mike DeGeorge and play their home games at Robert A. Mott Athletics Center.
| Cal Poly Mustangs | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ||||
| University | California Polytechnic State University | |||
| Head coach | Mike DeGeorge (1st season) | |||
| Conference | Big West | |||
| Location | San Luis Obispo, California | |||
| Arena | Mott Athletics Center (Capacity: 3,032) | |||
| Nickname | Mustangs | |||
| Colors | Poly green, copper gold, and stadium gold | |||
| Uniforms | ||||
| ||||
| NCAA tournament Final Four | ||||
| 1981* | ||||
| NCAA tournament Elite Eight | ||||
| 1977*, 1981* | ||||
| NCAA tournament Sweet Sixteen | ||||
| 1977*, 1980*, 1981*, 1982* | ||||
| NCAA tournament appearances | ||||
| 1971*, 1974*, 1977*, 1980*, 1981*, 1982*, 1986*, 2014 *at Division II level | ||||
| Conference tournament champions | ||||
| Big West: 2014 | ||||
| Conference regular season champions | ||||
| CCAA: 1955, 1956, 1972, 1974, 1977, 1980, 1981 (co), 1986, 1987 (co) American West: 1996 | ||||
The team began playing at the Division I level in 1994–95, and shortly thereafter won a regular-season conference title in the four-team American West Conference (since disbanded) with a 5–1 record in 1996. The 1995–96 championship season saw Cal Poly's Ben Larson average 3.45 steals per game, the third-most in NCAA history, while winning the AWC Player of the Year award. The Mustangs then joined the Big West ahead of the 1996–97 school year.
In 2009, ESPN selected Ernie Wheeler (1972–86) as the top coach in school history, along with Derek Stockalper as the best player in program history (joined by Jim Schultz, Mike Wozniak, Mike LaRoche and Varnie Dennis as the network's then-all time starting five).
Cal Poly advanced to its first Division I NCAA Tournament in 2014 after a historic run in the Big West Conference tournament, becoming the first 7th seed to win the championship, as the Mustangs defeated CSUN, 61–59, following a go-ahead 3-pointer made by Ridge Shipley at the Honda Center. Cal Poly earned the 16th seed and defeated Texas Southern in the NCAA first round in Dayton. Cal Poly then advanced to the 2nd Round, where they were defeated by unbeaten top seed Wichita State 64–37.
Prior to the 2014 conference tournament championship-game victory, Cal Poly advanced to the Big West Championship Game on two other occasions: in 2003 (falling to Utah State) and 2007 (to Long Beach State).