Was Nova a blue blood though? No sweet 16s for almost two full decades before 2005. They were the only team that could consistently play with top ten teams. That allowed the conference to look solid when Creighton or Providence types had top 20 teams and a few others scraped into the tournament.
Nova wasn't a blue blood, it became one. It is one now, blue blood meaning dynastic.
My point is only this. There aren't many programs that go from being blue bloods - prominent in the national conversation - over a period of time to not being in the national conversation. This because the factors that create dynastic programs are for the most part baked into environments of those programs. Indiana isn't quite the Indiana of Hoosiers but it has the potential energy to be and meanwhile everyone knows who the coach is. UCLA and Kentucky will always be part of the national conversation. Louisville took a bit of a misstep but will be back in less time than it took Scot Drew to pay off enough recruits to win a NC. Even Syracuse is going to survive Boeheim's departure, there being no shortage of corrupt used car dealers in upstate NY.
The programs that haven't survived are socio-economically unique: St John's, DePaul, throw in Georgetown. Go back further: Columbia, NYU. Notice any similarities? It's not religion, Providence and Notre Dame are fine. How many people are there in the information age who are going to commit to four years of garbage basketball at an academically disadvantaged mediocre school in shitty part of a dying city where everyone's priority is defunding the police. I was in Manhattan recently, it smalls like Dinkins is mayor. Whereas otoh they can go to Idaho and be on the telly three times a week.
I sometimes wonder whether Lou picked Mahoney for spite, knowing he'd fail, the same way Tiberius championed Caligula.