The fact that there are Cinderella teams from tiny schools who make a tournament run every year proves this. It's a lot harder to beat a ranked team in Football, like #3 Oklahoma or #16 TCU, on the road. It was huge news when Appalachian State beat #5 Michigan - something that people still talk about and Michigan has arguably not fully recovered from yet. But every year teams like Butler and VCU make long runs in the tourney.
So I don't think you can say that the sweet sixteen is the same as a NY6. Otherwise we would have seen more than a handful of teams break in, and I don't think you can put TCU, BSU, or Utah are on the same level as Valparaiso or Kent State.
But the fact is that Rose has had some embarrassing losses, arguably more than Bronco has, and had choked in assume big games, just as Bronco has. It is just interesting that some of the biggest Bronco detractors are also Rose supporters.