Upset

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Upset is a term used when referring to a competition, frequently in electoral politics or sports. When an upset occurs, the party popularly expected to win (the favorite) is defeated by an underdog the majority expects to lose, defying the conventional wisdom.

[edit] Examples of major upsets in politics

• 1948 - Unpopular Democratic United States President Harry Truman defeats the highly favored Republican candidate Thomas Dewey.
• 1990 - Paul Wellstone, an underfunded professor, defeats popular Senator Rudy Boschwitz in the United States Senate race. In Texas, Ann Richards defeats Clayton Williams in the race for Texas governor.
• 1994 - Texas Republican George W. Bush defeats highly favored and very popular Democrat incumbent Ann Richards in the race for Texas governor.
• 2006 - Dave Loebsack a Democrat and a political science professor at Cornell College defeats 30 year imcumbent Iowa congressman Jim Leach.
• 2006- Nancy Boyda a Democrat defeats Kansas Congressman Jim Ryan who had held the seat for five terms.
• 2006 - Carol Shea-Porter a social worker defeats two term imcumbent Jeb Bradley.
• 2006 - Jim Webb, a Democrat who had served as Secretary of the Navy under Reagen, wins the senate seat away from incumbent Republican senator and former George Allen after he made a series of mistakes starting with the Macaca Controversy during the 2006 Midterm Elections in Virginia.
• 2007 -Greg Ballard defeats incumbent Indianapolis mayor Bart Peterson despite being outspent by a huge margin.

[edit] Examples of major upsets in sports

• 1913 - U.S. Open - Francis Ouimet, a 20-year-old American amateur and immigrant, defeats golf superstars Ted Ray and Harry Vardon.
• 1924 - Football (soccer) - At the Olympic games in Paris, Sweden defeats Belgium, a higher ranked team, by 8-1. This is still ranked as the biggest international soccer upset ever according to Elo ratings [1].
• 1950 - Football (soccer) - In the World Cup, the United States shocks England in a match considered one of the biggest surprises in World Cup history.
• 1950 - In the same competition Uruguay scored an upset of Brazil in the world cup final, with the latter nation needing only a draw to win the World Cup; this game is known as the Maracanazo (or Maracanaço).
• 1954 - Tiny Milan High School in Milan, Indiana, enrollment then 161, beats Muncie Central High School, enrollment then over 1,600, in the Indiana High School State Basketball Championships by a score of 32-30. The 1986 movie classic Hoosiers is loosely based on the story of the Milan team.
• 1969 - American football - Super Bowl III - The New York Jets shock the Baltimore Colts to win 16-7 when they were the heavy underdog, representing the lightly-regarded American Football League.
• 1969 - Major League Baseball - 1969 World Series - The New York Mets, an expansion team that never previously finished higher than ninth place, reached the World Series and upset the favored Baltimore Orioles 4 games to 1.
• 1972 - 1972 Summer Olympics Basketball - The Soviet team, in a highly controversial finish, defeated the USA team 51-50 in the gold medal game. This marked the first time in Olympic Basketball history that the USA team failed to earn the gold medal, and was their first loss in 62 games.
• 1975 - In the open section of the World Open chess tournament, expert Alan Trefler (ELO rating 2075, 125 points below the lowest master rating) scores 8-1 to tie for first with International Grandmaster Pál Benkő.
• 1978 - Rugby union — Munster beat the All Blacks 12-0. Munster are the only Irish side ever to have beaten New Zealand, Including the Irish national side. More than 100,000 people claim to have been there the day it happened, despite Limerick's ground holding only around 12,000 at that time. The game is immortalized by a stage play Alone it Stands and the book Stand Up.
• 1980 - Ice hockey - In the Miracle on Ice, the United States beats the Soviet Union in the semifinals at the 1980 Olympics.
• 1982 - United States college basketball - 800 student Chaminade University upsets the number one team in the country, the Virginia Cavaliers, 77-72 in what is considered the biggest upset in college basketball history.
• 1982 - Football (soccer) - In the World Cup, newcomers Algeria scored the second victory in the tournament by an African side when they defeated two-time world champion West Germany 2-1.
• 1983 - Cricket - In the 1983 Cricket World Cup newcomers Zimbabwe shock Australia in England in their first ever ODI game winning by 13 runs the upset amongst the greatest upsets in Cricket. Duncan Fletcher the then Zimbabwe captain became the Man of the Match.
• 1983 - Cricket- Later in the 1983 World Cup, underdogs India shock favorites and two-time defending Champion West Indies in England winning by 43 runs; the upset was deemed as the greatest upset in Cricket and is cited as the reason so many Indians love Cricket.
• 1985 - U.S. college basketball - 1985 NCAA Men's Tournament - Villanova University, a No. 8 seed, upsets Georgetown, the defending champion and consensus No. 1 team in America, to win the championship.
• 1985 - College football - Oregon State beats Washington 21-20. What is most notable is that the Huskies were 37-point favorites, and this game was considered the largest reversal ever in spread betting until 2007.
• 1986 - Snooker - Joe Johnson, who began that year's World Snooker Championship as a 150-1 underdog, reached the final and defeated World number 1 Steve Davis 18 frames to 12 to win the title.
• 1990 - Football (soccer) - In the World Cup, Cameroon defeated the holding champions Argentina in the opening match 1-0 and became the first African team to reach the quarterfinals. They then lost to England 2-3 due to an extra-time penalty kick.
• 1990 - Boxing - James "Buster" Douglas knocks out then-undefeated Mike Tyson in 10 rounds.
• 1991 - College basketball - NCAA Tournament - The Duke Blue Devils upset the unbeaten defending champion UNLV 79-77 in the Final Four. UNLV had humiliated Duke the year before in the 1990 title game 103-73, which was the largest victory margin in an NCAA championship game.
• 1992 - Football (soccer) - In the FA Cup third round, defending champions Arsenal were beaten 2-1 by Wrexham, who had finished bottom of the league the previous season.
• 1992 - Football (soccer) - In Euro 92, Denmark, a last-minute replacement for the Yugoslavia team banned due to sanctions resulting from the Yugoslav wars, win the title.
• 1994 - Eighth-seeded Denver Nuggets (42-40) stun the first-seeded Seattle SuperSonics (63-19) in the first round of the 1994 NBA Western Conference Playoffs, after falling behind 2-0 in the best-of-five series, and then winning the next three games to be the first Eight-seed team in NBA history to ever defeat a one-seed.
• 1998, Women's college basketball – Harvard, the #16 seed in the West Regional of the NCAA Tournament, stuns top seed Stanford 71-67 at Stanford. This is the first and only time to date that a 16 seed has beaten a top seed in either the men's or women's tournament. (In fairness, it must be noted that Stanford had two starters unable to play due to torn ACLs.)
• 2000 - Football (soccer) - In the 1999-2000 French Cup semi final Calais RUFC, a team playing in the fourth division of the French football league (CFA), knock out reigning French champions Girondins Bordeaux 3-1 after extra time. Calais would give an admirable performance in the final, unluckily losing 2-1 to Nantes.
• 2000 - Olympic wrestling - American Rulon Gardner defeats Russian Alexander Karelin at the 2000 Summer Olympics. Prior to the match, Karelin was undefeated in 13 years without having given up a single point in six years, and had previously defeated Gardner in 1997.
• 2001 - College basketball - NCAA Tournament - The Hampton Pirates, a 15 seed, shock the 2 seeded Iowa State Cyclones and pull off a great NCAA Tournament upset.
• 2001 - Football (soccer) - In the Copa America 2001, the last minute replacement team, Honduras, defeats Brazil 2-0 in the quarter finals.
• 2002 - American football - Super Bowl XXXVI - The New England Patriots, 14-point underdogs, shock the St. Louis Rams to win 20-17 on an Adam Vinatieri field goal as time expired.
• 2002 - Football (soccer) - In the World Cup opening match, Senegal defeats defending champions France 1-0. The French subsequently left the competition in the first round, winless and scoreless.
• 2003 - In the 2003 Cricket World Cup, the minnow team Kenya defeated one of the top teams in the world, Sri Lanka, and with that victory advanced to the Semi-Finals of the tournament, becoming the first associate to advance to a Semi-Final. Kenya beat Sri Lanka by 53 runs. This was one of the greatest cricket upsets because of the comprehensive way in which Kenya won with bowler Collins Obuya taking record figures 5-24 and Kennedy Obuya scoring a patient 80, the victory put Kenya on the cricketing map.
• 2004 - Basketball-2004 NBA Finals- The Detroit Pistons beat the Los Angeles Lakers 4-1. This is one of the biggest upsets in basketball history because the Lakers had won 3 of the last 4 NBA Finals and had a starting lineup featuring four future Hall of Famers (Shaquille O'Neal, Kobe Bryant, Gary Payton, Karl Malone).
• 2004 - Football (soccer) - Greece, a 150-1 long shot according to some bookmakers, win Euro 2004 by defeating hosts Portugal twice as well as giants France and the Czech Republic.
• 2004 - Olympic Basketball - Puerto Rico defeats the USA in the first game of the Olympics by 17 points in a game that was dominated from the beginning from the Puerto Rican national team. Several weeks before, the USA won a friendly match prior to the Olympics by over 40 points.
• 2004 - American League Championship Series - The Boston Red Sox shock the New York Yankees after falling behind 3-0 and winning the last 4 games to eliminate the Yankees and go on to the World Series.
• 2005 - Formula 1 - Fernando Alonso and his team Mild Seven Renault unexpectedly defeated Seven time Champion Michael Schumacher and his glamour team Scuderia Ferrari for both drivers and constructor's championship while Ferrari struggled all year with a poor car and crippling tyre rule changes.
• 2006 - Ice hockey - In the semifinals of the women's tournament at the Winter Olympics, Sweden defeats the USA 3-2 in a shootout. This marked the first time that either the USA or eventual gold medalist Canada lost in an international women's hockey competition to any third nation.
• 2006 - College basketball — NCAA Tournament — The George Mason Patriots shock the world by upsetting four teams consecutively in the Washington, D.C. Regional to make it to the Final Four. The 11th-seeded Patriots beat #6 seed Michigan State, a participant in the previous year's Final Four; defending national champions and #3 seed North Carolina; #7 seed Wichita State; and top seed UConn before finally losing to eventual champions #3 Florida in the Final Four. The Patriots were given 400-1 odds to win the NCAA Tournament and were within two games of doing so.
• 2006 - American football - The unranked UCLA Bruins defeated the #2 ranked USC Trojans, knocking USC out of the BCS National Championship Game in Glendale, Arizona and ending UCLA's seven year losing streak to the Trojans.
• 2007 - Mixed martial arts - UFC - At UFC 69: Shootout, Matt Serra defeats heavily favored Georges St. Pierre via TKO at 3:25 in the 1st round.
• 2007 - 2007 NBA Playoffs - The Golden State Warriors, seeded #8, upset the highly favored Dallas Mavericks 4-2 in the first round, after Dallas had the best record in the season, winning 67 games. This marked the first time an eighth seed beat a first seed in a best of seven NBA playoff series.
• 2007 - In the 2007 Cricket World Cup, the minnow team Ireland defeated the 3rd highest ranked team in the world, Pakistan, in the group stages, knocking them out of the tournament.
• 2007 - College football - Appalachian State beats #5 ranked Michigan 34-32. This is the first time a Division I FCS (formerly known as I-AA) team beats a Division I FBS Associated Press ranked team.
• 2007 - College football - Unranked Rutgers defeats #2 USF (University of South Florida) 30-27 at Rutgers Stadium in Piscataway, New Jersey.
• 2007 - College football - USC is upset by Stanford 24-23 at home. USC was ranked #1 in the Coaches Poll and #2 in the AP Poll and was a 40 point favorite to win the game. Stanford's backup quarterback, Tavita Pritchard, started the game and Stanford converted on two 4th downs in the final drive, scoring the tying touchdown and subsequent go-ahead PAT to go up by one point with 49 seconds left. The Cardinal's win was the greatest point spread ever overcome in college football history, surpassing the aforementioned 1985 Oregon State-Washington game.
• 2007 - In the 2007 ICC World Twenty20, the minnow team Zimbabwe defeated the highest ranked team in the world, Australia, in one of the most emphatic cricket upsets ever, winning by 5 wickets. Brendan Taylor was the man who mastered the upset with an unbeaten 60 off just 45 balls.

[edit] The first "upset" victory

1919 - Horse racing - The term "upset" is falsely thought to derive from a horse of the same name. In the 1919 Sanford Memorial Stakes, 100-1 longshot Upset handed racing hegemon Man o' War the only loss of the stallion's career. Man o' War had suffered an uncharacterisric poor start — he was still circling behind the starting line when the race began. (This was before mechanical starting gates were widely used. Horses circled behind the starting line, then lined up behind a cord strung across the track, which was jerked out of the way when the race starter dropped a flag. Race courses which do not use a starting gate still use this method today. Steeplechase races do this due to the high number of starters.)

2002 - George Thompson, a lexicographic researcher, used the full-text online search capabilities of the New York Times databases to disprove this claimed coinage. The verb to upset and the noun upset, were traced to the years 1865 and 1877, respectively. [2]pt:Zebra (futebol)