Bet March Madness Using Stats There are a lot of different ways to attack the bracket and individual games. For the very numerical based handicapper, FiveThirtyEight tries to give percentages on every game using advanced analytics, kenpom is the bible for statheads, and NCAA NET is the official metric that the selection committee uses to help them with bracketing. March Madness odds, like all sports betting odds, are set to try to draw an equal amount of betting to each team. They draw you in with what looks like fair prices on favorites and long enough odds on underdogs that they all seem worth a shot. Check out our complete guide on the best places to watch March Mayhem 2021 in Las Vegas including the best sports bars, the biggest sportsbooks, and basketball viewing parties for these college basketball tournament games.

February is drawing to a close, which means it’s almost time for the NCAA Tournament. While the NBA is king in terms of popularity in the US, millions of Americans will suddenly transform into college basketball experts at some point over the next few weeks. Filling out a bracket is essentially a rite of passage for Americans nowadays.
The NCAA Tournament is also one of the more popular events for betting on the American sports calendar. Americans reportedly wagered more than $8 billion on the 2019 NCAA Tournament, which was a new record. One would imagine March Madness will continue to set records in that regard moving forward, especially with the way sports betting is expanding in popularity and legality throughout the United States. About 47 million Americans bet on March Madness last year, which comes out to one of every five adults in the country.

If you’re going to find yourself in Las Vegas for the event, we’ve listed the best sportsbooks in Las Vegas that offer March Madness betting. Now, this leads us to the next thing that all bettors should take into account:

Everyone has their own strategy when it comes to filling out their brackets. Some take a deep dive into the numbers in an attempt to become as educated as possible about every team in the tournament. Others take a more simplified approach, like choosing which mascot they prefer or picking a team based on how cool the uniforms look.

That said, there are steps you can take in order to give yourself an edge. If you’re new to betting on the NCAA Tournament, be sure to take heed of the following 5 tips that can help you become a profitable college basketball bettor in March.

1 – Seeding Matters in March Madness Betting

68 teams qualify for the tournament on a yearly basis, but all teams are not created equal. In an attempt to keep things interesting, the NCAA convenes a committee of experts in order to seed all 68 teams based on perceived quality. The best teams in the country get higher seeds, while lesser teams get lower seeds.

A well-known program like Duke, North Carolina or UCLA is generally going to be better than the Austin Peay States, UTEPs and Florida Atlantics of the world. This obviously isn’t the case every year, but high seeds generally make for smart bets when it comes to the NCAA Tournament. In fact, no team seeded No. 1 in a region lost their first-round game until Virginia fell at the hands of UMBC in 2018. Before that upset, No. 16 seeds were 0-132 all-time against top seeds in first-round matchups. As of now, the record for 16s is 1-139 against teams seeded No. 1.

In the history of the Final Four, the higher seed has covered the spread a whopping 75 percent of the time. Upsets happen every year, but the smart money is still behind the favorites.

2 – Take Note of Defense

The college game is generally less fluid than the one we see at the professional level. College games are only 40 minutes long as opposed to 48-minute NBA games, and scoring is at a premium. Teams that coast through the regular season thanks to a high-scoring offense usually come to find that breaking down a top-tier defense is more complicated once you get to the tournament.

So, betting on teams that excel on defense is a wise move. Teams that rely too heavily on offense while ignoring the other end of the floor are prone to falling flat in the tournament. One poor shooting performance can lead to an early exit. The defense is all about the hustle. A team that plays with a defense-first approach is more able to grind out a result despite a rough shooting performance than a team that doesn’t give as much effort on that side of the court.

If you’re betting on a quality defensive team, it’s also smart to bet the under in those same games.

3 – Take Personal Bias Out of the Equation

This tip applies to betting on all sports, not just college basketball. In most cases, people like to back their favorite teams to win. If you went to college in Oregon, for example, you’re going to have a hard time not betting on the Ducks to win every game they play. That’s just the nature of being a fan.

However, betting with your heart is an easy way to lose money in a hurry. Fans generally think their own favorite team is better than it really is, which can lead to some disastrous betting decisions. The smartest thing you can do as a bettor is to either avoid betting on games involving your favorite team or take an honest approach to it.

Frankly, the games involving your favorite team will be more fun to watch if you aren’t also having to sweat a point spread along the way. Personal biases also apply to fill out your bracket. Don’t bet on a team to win a game just because you previously picked them to advance to the next round in your office pool.

4 – Don’t Bet on Every March Madness Game

With 68 teams in the field, there are plenty of betting options when it comes to March Madness. The fact that it’s a single-elimination tournament makes the stakes incredibly high. There are also enough games to where you can take a more disciplined approach to the action you want to get.

It can be easy to get caught up in the spectacle of the NCAA Tournament. If you do a basic level of research, you’ll probably start to feel as though you’re an expert. However, part of the charm when it comes to March Madness is the uncertainty. Needless to say, nobody saw UMBC beating Virginia in 2018 before it actually happened. Upsets are the hallmark of the NCAA’s signature event.

While betting on every game might seem fun at first, it won’t take long for you to realize that it was a mistake. Not every game is going to have great value from a betting perspective, which is why you have to be diligent about picking the right bets. Avoiding doubling down and chasing your losses is also a smart way to manage your bankroll.

5 – Location Matters

The NCAA Tournament takes place at a variety of sites all over the United States, and often times the locations are chosen strategically to help higher seeds.

Home court advantage matters during the regular season, and it’s even more meaningful at “neutral site” tournament games. Fans are more likely to travel in support of their favorite team if the tournament games happen to be located conveniently close to campus. Oddsmakers are on top of things, but any little edge can help you as a bettor.

Conclusion

There are no tried-and-true methods to ensuring that you’ll be profitable in your March Madness betting endeavors. However, following these easy tips will at least give you a head start if you’re dipping your toes into the NCAA Tournament betting pond for the first time.

To paraphrase the poet Alfred Lord Tennyson, “In the Spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of… college basketball.”

Every year from the end of February to the beginning of April, the NCAA pits the top 68 college basketball teams in the country to see who the best is.

And each year, millions upon millions are wagered on the games.

It has become so popular that multi-billionaire businessman Warren Buffett offers a prize of $1 million every year for life to the person that picks a perfect March Madness bracket. The odds of that happening are about 1 in 128 billion.

But Buffett isn’t the only one offering money. Many websites, including sites that feature fantasy sports, offer prizes for picking perfect brackets and offer prizes for picking certain percentages of winners.

Everyone wants a piece of the $1 billion in revenue that March Madness generates, including sportsbooks.

Origins of March Madness

The idea for a national college basketball championship started with the idea of Harold Olsen, the head coach of Ohio State University. He had been lobbying for a national championship for some time.

In 1939, the National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) agreed to hold the first national collegiate basketball championships.

The first tournament featured eight teams. They were broken down into an Eastern tournament and a Western tournament. The teams were:

East – Tournament held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. March 18-19

• Brown University
• Ohio State University
• Villanova University
• Wake Forest University

West – Tournament held in San Francisco, California. March 20-21

• The University of Oklahoma
• The University of Oregon
• The University of Texas at Austin
• Utah State University

The regional championships took place over two weekends. The East regional tournament took place on March 17^th and 18^th. The West took place on March 20^th and 21^st. The winners of each tournament, Ohio and Oregon, met in Evanston, Illinois, on March 27.

Oregon won the first championship with a score of 46 to 33.

The first tournament was not a financial success. The tournament wound up with a debt of over $2,500 ($46,000 in 2019 dollars). Because of the loss, the NABC considered not running the event again. However, the NABC made a deal with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) to cover the losses and to take over the tournament going forward.

The tournament would remain relatively the same for the first 12 years of its existence. The first major change came in 1951 when the number of teams was increased from 8 to 16.

Between 1951 and today, the number of teams has increased in the following manner:

• 1953 – Tournament was increased to 22 teams
• 1953-1968 – Tournament participants varied between 22 and 25 teams
• 1969 – Tournament was permanently increased to 25 teams
• 1975 – Tournament increased to 32 teams broken down in the following manner:
  • 16 conference champions
  • 12 at-large (wild card) teams from each conference
  • 4 teams that qualified via Eastern College Athletic Conference tournaments
• 1978 – A seeding process was initiated
• 1979 – Tournament increased to 40 teams, with 24 teams given first-round byes based on conference tournaments
• 1980 – Tournament was increased to 48 teams
  • 24 teams received automatic spots
  • 24 teams received at-large spots
  • 16 teams received first-round byes
• 1981 – The Ratings Percentage Index (RPI) was created to rank teams. It was particularly helpful for at-large bids
• 1983 – Tournament was increased to 52 teams
• 1984 – Tournament was increased to 53 teams
• 1985 – Tournament was increased to 64 teams
• 2001 – Tournament was increased to 65 teams
• 2011 – Tournament was increased to 68 teams

March Madness

The origins of the name “March Madness” actually come from high school basketball. In 1939, an official with the Illinois High School Association named HV Porter used the phrase to describe the Illinois basketball in a poem. The phrase spread over the next few decades to describe high school basketball in the Midwest.

The term became associated with NCAA in the 1980s when Brent Musburger, who was from Chicago, started using the term to describe the college tournaments.

In the 1990s, IHSA bought the trademark for the term March Madness. They then sued an NCAA licensee for using the name in a video game. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that they both had rights to the trademark and created the concept of “dual-use trademark,” letting both organizations use the name.

Eventually, the two would form a company that would protect the trademark and license the name.

In the late 2000s, the IHSA would give the trademark to the NCAA, but retained the right to use the name for their tournament.

Other Names Used in the Tournament

• Selection Sunday – The day that all the teams are officially announced for the tournament.
• First 4 – This refers to the first four games of the tournament. Eight teams play each other for a berth in the first round of the tournament.
• Sweet 16 – This is the name for the last 16 teams in the tournament play. This is also an “imported” name from the high school leagues. The Kentucky High School Athletic Association (KHSAA) created and owns the name, and the NCAA licenses it for the tournament.
• Elite 8 – This is the name for the quarterfinals of the tournament. The name also comes from the IHSA and is managed by the joint corporation that manages the March Madness name.
• Final 4 – The semi-finals of the tournament, where the last four teams play to determine the two teams that will vie for the championships.

The Current Format

The current format of the tournament is held over a three-week period. The First 4 starts off the tournament with a two-day event. It usually occurs the second or third week of March on Tuesday and Wednesday. This sets up the final 64 in the first round. An example of the schedule looks like this:

• First 4 – First week
• First/Second Rounds – First week
• South Regional – Second week
• West Regional – Second week
• East Regional – Second week
• Midwest Regional – Second week
• Final Four, National Championship – Third week

It should be noted that the tournament as it is currently set up is held in 14 cities, with the First 4 held in one city, the first and second rounds split up in eight cities, the regionals held in four different cities, and the Final 4/National Championship held in another city. All cities except the First 4 and the Final 4 are in the regions that the teams normally play in.

The teams are all announced on “Selection Sunday,” which is the Sunday prior to the First 4. All the teams are put into brackets for the single-elimination tournament.

These brackets play an important role in how people will bet on the games.

Seeding the Teams

The rankings for the 68 teams in the tournament are done by a selection committee. The committee is made up of ten conference commissioners and athletic directors within the NCAA who are elected for five-year terms.

The members of the committee rank the teams from 1 to 68, then the teams are broken down by region.

The seeds are distributed among the regions in order, so the first-seeded teams in each region are placed first, the second are placed second, etc., until all 16 teams are distributed for each region.

The matchup of the teams can be affected by a number of factors, including if teams are in the same conference, the venues the team play in (no team can play on their home court), rematches of previous season or regular season tournament games, and more. Because of this, a regional seed can be moved around to accommodate these requirements.

Once these seeds are worked out, the brackets are then established.

Betting on the First Round

The first round of the tournament has the most opportunities to bet. It also provides the best opportunities to win.

The First 4 are a bit hard to find winners. These are all the lowest-seeded teams in the tournament. This isn’t to say that they’re horrible teams because Division I Basketball has 347 teams in the United States. So the eight that make it to the First 4 are better than 279 other teams.

The First 4 are tough to pick winners in most cases because they’re generally all evenly matched. Occasionally, a clear winner can be picked, but in most cases, it could be hard.

The full first round is another story, however. The brackets are set up in each region in the following way:

• The number 1 seed faces the number 16 seed
• The number 2 seed faces the number 15 seed
• The number 3 seed faces the number 14 seed
• The number 4 seed faces the number 13 seed
• The number 5 seed faces the number 12 seed
• The number 6 seed faces the number 11 seed
• The number 7 seed faces the number 10 seed
• The number 8 seed faces the number 9 seed

So, you can see, the “bracketology” of the tournament places the first versus the last place in each region against each other, second-best versus the second to last, etc. So placing a bet on at least half of the games is statically an easy choice because it is unlikely (but certainly not impossible) that a 16^th seed will beat a number 1 seed team. The same could be said for an 11^th seed beating a 6^th seed. The closer the seeds are, however, the harder it may be to choose a winner.

Another thing to consider is the overall seeds. A number 1 seed in a region could be the number 1 seed for the tournament as a whole, while the number 16 seed in a region could be the number 64 seed overall.

While seeds are important to consider, another important factor to consider is the team’s record. And I’m not just speaking overall wins and losses, but wins and losses against their road schedule.

In NCAA basketball, a team is limited to 31 games each season (not including pre-season or tournaments during the season). It is possible for a team to have a majority of their games at home. If this is the case, the team could have made it to March Madness with a majority of home wins and heavy losses at away games. This is important. All NCAA Tournament games are away games. So take that into account when betting.

Another thing to look at is how a team does during in-season tournaments. Schools may take part in any of the 50+ regular season tournaments that are offered. Looking at how they perform under that pressure is important to see how they’ll perform in the ultimate tournament for college basketball.

Also, how is the team looking as they enter the tournament? Did they get a great start, and in their final games, did they “drop the ball”? If a team is limping into March Madness, it’s probably a good bet that they won’t last long.

History is another thing to consider. While in theory, each team is a completely new team every four years, the coaches and staff can be at a school for decades.

Bettors can look to historical winners such as UCLA, which has won 11 National Championships. They also may look to multiple-time winners who’ve won recently like Kentucky, North Carolina, or Duke.

You can also look at the historical statistics of the brackets. One common occurrence is that of the number 5 versus the number 12 bracket. In this bracket, historically, the number 12 seed beats the spread against the number 5 seed about one-third of the time. One number 12 team usually beats the number 5 team outright.

Betting on the Second Round

So now that the first round is done, the wheat has been separated from the chaff. We can get a clearer picture of who’ll excel and who’ll be knocked out. Or will we?

Second-round betting can be just as complicated as the first round. Now we’re down to 32 teams. 16 games to bet on.

We can certainly look at seeding again. Higher seeds are likely to beat lower seeds. The matchups on the second round look like this for each region:

• Winner of 1^st seed versus 16^th seed faces the winner of 8^th seed versus 9^th seed
• Winner of 5^th seed versus 12^th seed faces the winner of 4^th seed versus 13^th seed
• Winner of 6^th seed versus 11^th seed faces the winner of 3^rd seed versus 14^th seed
• Winner of 7^th seed versus 10^th seed faces the winner of 2^nd seed versus 15^th seed

So with these games, you can see that there can be a big disparity in the teams playing each other from a seeding perspective. This is certainly a way to choose a winner.

Vegas March Madness Betting Strategy Against

But I like to look at the first game. Did the team blow out the other team? A 1^st seed should have a decisive victory over a 16^th seed, at least in my opinion. If they struggled, it might be a sign of weakness. In that same vein, if there was an upset or a blowout in an evenly matched game in the first round, I definitely want to take that into consideration in my betting and go with the team’s momentum in that case.

History can come into play here, too. If a team has a habit of winning the first round and blowing it in the second, then I’m going to bet on that streak continuing.

I also look at other factors like if any players were injured in the first round that may affect the team’s chances of winning or if an injured player who couldn’t play in the first round can now play in the second.

I like second-round betting more than the first because I have a better idea of who really wants the championship and who’s just there because they won a few games in the season.

Later Round Regional Betting

Once the tournament is down to the “Sweet 16,” betting can become harder. After all, 52 other teams have been knocked out of the tournament. If a team has made it this far, then they’re either lucky or skilled.

It is still important to know that in the Sweet 16 and the Elite 8, the teams are still playing other teams from their region, so there may be some familiarity. Maybe not a big familiarity, as a region could have a situation where teams rarely play each other, but at this level, it’s fair to say they have had some sort of history.

So look at that history. This is where I look less at the season record and more at the head to head record of each team. How have they done against each other overall? How have they done against each other in the last decade? That will be how I put the weight behind my bets.

Betting on the Final 4

The Final 4 betting can sometimes be easier than that of the Sweet 16 or the Elite 8. The reason is that these teams are all from different regions and conferences.

Anyone who follows sports knows that in some cases, a team dominated a conference because the conference is weak overall.

So in cases where a team that is in a weak conference gets pitted against a team from a tough conference, I go with the team from the tough conference. I don’t care if the weak conference team is undefeated. I’m a firm believer that iron sharpens iron. So if a team has been playing monsters all year, they’ll prepare for monsters, and vice versa.

Betting on the National Championship

This is going to be the toughest one to bet on. These two teams have overcome the other 66 teams in the tournament to make it to the last two.

I tend to look at factors that I used in other rounds, such as in-season tournament play, the teams’ away record, the teams’ overall record, injuries, history of how they have done in previous March Madness tournaments, and how well they’ve done in the tournament overall.

I find that this data helps in selecting a winner, but nothing can measure desire or heart. Sometimes, the team can have all the stats but lose the big one because the other team wanted it more. But the numbers always help.

March Madness Betting Games

Prop Bets

I’m a big fan of prop bets. Here are some common March Madness Prop Bets:

• NCAA Tournament Most Outstanding Player
• The highest single-game point total for any player during NCAA Tournament
• The lowest single-game point total for any team during NCAA Tournament
• NCAA Championship Winning Conference
• Will a major media outlet release an NCAA Men’s Basketball violations investigative report during the tournament?
• Total buzzer-beating shots in Round of 64 during NCAA Tournament
• How many #1 seeds will reach the Final 4?
• Will a Big 10 team win the tournament?
• Will a Big East team win the tournament?
• Will a #1 seed win the tournament?
• Will a #2 seed win the tournament?
• Total overtime games in Round of 64
• Largest margin of victory
• All four No. 1 seeds reach Final Four

Many more prop bets are available. After all, you can have a prop bet on each game, each round, each conference, and more.

Conclusion

The three weeks in March that the NCAA holds its annual tournament to crown a national champion is a basketball fan and bettor’s dream. With literally hundreds of bets to choose from, opportunities to win just like your favorite college team abound.

March Madness Betting Sites

And with the popularity of the tournament, it is easy to not only place regular bets but prop bets too. You can even find bets that I’ve mentioned in passing, such as guessing the brackets to win money.

Vegas March Madness Betting Strategy Games