I've always kind of had the idea that future NBA superstars would always be good enough to lead even the most horrible supporting cast to the NCAA tournament. I wasn't sure if this was all in my head though so went back a couple of draft classes to see if this was true for the top 5 picks and the lottery as a whole. Obviously European players aren't relevant for this, but was curious how many players were top 3-8 picks that couldn't make it to the big dance (with simmons obviously being a really curious case)
I am sure it is has happened many times, but in the recent era (since high schoolers have been forced to play one year) the guys that come to mind from recent drafts all did it.
2016: Ingram, Brown, Hield, Dunn, Poetl, Sabonis Prince etc all made tourney.
Criss was only player not to appear
Note: While some of these schools make it every year some like Providence, California clearly do not and Dunn definitely did not have lots of talent alongside him outside of Bentil
2015: Every lottery pick was on an NCAA tourney team
Note: This means very little because all were at traditional basketball powers with possible exception of ohio state and wisconsin (who don't make it every year). Also high number of foreign players decereased analyzed players.
2014: I believe every player in top 17 that played in college made the tourney. Some non super dominant basketball powerhouses included such as Creighton, Oklahoma state, michigan, nc state (they actually have not been that great the last decade),
2013: It looks like Bennet actually led UNLV to the tourney. However, there were two more notable examples here as Caldwell Pope (Georgia) and Mcollum (Lehigh) and were unable to lead their teams to the tourney.
2012: I may have missed someone here cause I did not go as rigorously as I did on other years. It seems like every one in the lottery made it with the exception of Lillard who led weber state to 24-6 but not good enough for the tournament. Some non traditional powerhouses to be led to the tourney included Washington, St Bonaventure,
I don't really have time to go back to many more years, but I really can't think of another example of the top of my head were a number 1 or number 2 pick couldn't get their team to the dance.
Off memory, even players like Michael Olowakandi led Pacific of all places to the tourney. Obviously there is a big confounding factors that many of these players go to Kentucky, Kansas or UNC that make the tourney every single year, while LSU does not. However, does it say something about how polished Simmons is that he couldn't make a bigger influence on the game's outcomes? Or was it a historically bad supporting cast?