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They're the first 15-seed to make the Sweet 16, and they did it in astounding fashion. It's not just that they're playing well, it's that they are playing a high-flying, energetic style that produces a large number of highlight-reel plays.
Florida Gulf Coast is an anonymous mid-major school with uber-athletic players that try to dunk on every single possession, and that is why they've become everyone's favorite cult team.
According to Tim Layden of SI, the team practices lobs instead of regular passes:
FGCU coach Andy Enfield told me they practice lobs because chest-level passes are disadvantageous for tall athletes...(and less fun for us)
— Tim Layden (@SITimLayden) March 24, 2013
And the school has nicknamed itself "Dunk City," an homage to the LA Clippers' Lob City moniker.
They are a bizarro Cinderella team. They don't hit a ton of threes or win on experience and fundamentals like many of the lower-seeds that make unlikely tourney runs. They are more athletic than the big-time teams they are playing, and they try to exploit that advantage.
Here's sampling of what they did to SDSU.
The first dunk an alley-oop where Eric McKnight pulls the ball from behind his head and slams it home:
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The second was a straight-up posterization on a SDSU player who was trying to take a charge (via @bubbaprog):
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They have fun. They are fun:
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