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The NCAA Tournament, March Madness, ranks second to only the Superbowl in terms of betting interest and it’s not far behind. To assist, I have done a study that outlines some overall NCAA tournament trends using a nine year data set of NCAA Tournament outcomes from 1998-2006. This study encompasses every single NCAA Tournament game that was played during that span. For simplicity, I have broken the study down into three basic categories: (1) general trends, (2) trends by seeding, and (3) trends by pointspread range. There will be subsequent editions of this article forthcoming that will deal specifically with Round 1 (round of 65), Round 2 (round of 32), Sweet 16, and Elite 8 onward.
General Trends:
Before jumping into the numbers, let me pose a simple question. Could you pick the straight up winner of each and every NCAA tournament game at a 55% or better rate? How about a 60% or better rate? Remember, we are talking about just identifying the straight up winner with no point spread involved. Presumably, most of you would say you could pick the straight up winner at 55%, and most would probably state an even higher rate. My question then becomes: then why don’t you do just that? One of the most glaring trends out there is the frequency with which straight up winners also cover the pointspread in the NCAA Tournament. In fact, straight up winners are 423-133-13 ATS (76.1%) over the past nine years in March Madness. This simply means that if you could pick the SU winner, you would be picking ATS winners at a 3:1 ratio. To put that into a little different perspective, a $100 per game player who bets $110 to win $100 would be $27,670 wealthier if he or she could simply pick the straight-up winners. A “nickel” player that wagers $550 to make $500 per game would be up $138,350 dollars!
Since common sense tells us that the 423-133-13 ATS trend above has two components: (1) Underdogs that win straight-up, and (2) favorites that win and cover the pointspread, some might figure they can simply play the favorite in every tournament game and win big. This misconception leads me to my next observation. In the simplest of terms, underdogs are still a better NCAA Tournament bet than favorites. Specifically, underdogs have gone 303-251-15 ATS (54.7%) over the past nine NCAA Tournaments combined. So, playing all favorites would have netted you a 45.3% win percentage that would have bankrupted even the $50 dollar per game player as he would be down $4,115. While I have just shown that underdogs are indeed the best wager, favorites that do win the game straight-up also tend to cover the pointspread. Since 1998, favorites have won straight-up in 396 of the 565 games played, and favorites that have won straight-up have gone 251-133-13 ATS (65.4%). What this also shows is that there have been 169 upsets during those 9 NCAA Tournaments where the underdog has won straight-up.
Seeding Trends:
The two best seeds over the past nine years have been #10 and #12 seeds. Both are hitting at about 58% for all games played during that span, although it should be noted that they have not performed up to expectations over the past 3 seasons with #10 seeds going 7-10-1 ATS in all games played, while #12 seeds have gone 9-9 ATS during this most recent 3-year period. In contrast, the worst performing seed has been the #14 seeds as they are 16-23-1 ATS (41%) followed by #7 seeds going 29-34-1 ATS (46%) over the course of this study. Note that the lowly #16 seed has been a 50/50 proposition at 18-18 ATS, and given that no #16 has ever beat a #1 seed that means that the sexy #1 seeds are also a losing proposition at 18-18 ATS.
Pointspread Range Trends:
There are a couple pointspread ranges that seem to historically be money-making propositions. First, small double digit favorites have underachieved by a wide margin. Namely, favorites priced between -11 and -14 are just 19-33-3 ATS (36.5%) during the past nine tournaments combined. Favorites just below this price range were almost as bad as favorites between -8 and -10.5 were 35-40-2 ATS (46.7%). Therefore, playing on underdogs priced between +8 and +14 would have yielded a record of 73-54-5 ATS (57.5%) over the past nine years.
I also noted a dichotomy between very small favorites and very large favorites. Specifically, be weary of playing small favorites at -3.5 or less, as they were just 70-95-4 ATS (42.4%). On the other hand, do not be afraid to lay heavy chalk because favorites at -14.5 or greater have been a decent 48-42 ATS (53.3%). This, however, these it should be noted that these big favorites of -14.5 or more have not been profitable in either of the past two years going 2-7 ATS in 2005 and 1-4 ATS in 2006.
Conclusion:
Using combinations of the factors outlined above can make for a very profitable March Madness, especially when specific factors above are utilized in specific rounds. For instance, dogs have gone 28-20 ATS in the 2nd round, and small favorites of -3.5 or less are 3-8 ATS in the final three rounds last 3 seasons. Those are just small tidbits of the volumes of information that can be found. A database is useful in helping to uncover situations where NCAA Tournament teams have historically overachieved or underachieved. However, following the simple criteria that I have researched for this paper will give you a good solid footing to start your search.
General Trends:
Before jumping into the numbers, let me pose a simple question. Could you pick the straight up winner of each and every NCAA tournament game at a 55% or better rate? How about a 60% or better rate? Remember, we are talking about just identifying the straight up winner with no point spread involved. Presumably, most of you would say you could pick the straight up winner at 55%, and most would probably state an even higher rate. My question then becomes: then why don’t you do just that? One of the most glaring trends out there is the frequency with which straight up winners also cover the pointspread in the NCAA Tournament. In fact, straight up winners are 423-133-13 ATS (76.1%) over the past nine years in March Madness. This simply means that if you could pick the SU winner, you would be picking ATS winners at a 3:1 ratio. To put that into a little different perspective, a $100 per game player who bets $110 to win $100 would be $27,670 wealthier if he or she could simply pick the straight-up winners. A “nickel” player that wagers $550 to make $500 per game would be up $138,350 dollars!
Since common sense tells us that the 423-133-13 ATS trend above has two components: (1) Underdogs that win straight-up, and (2) favorites that win and cover the pointspread, some might figure they can simply play the favorite in every tournament game and win big. This misconception leads me to my next observation. In the simplest of terms, underdogs are still a better NCAA Tournament bet than favorites. Specifically, underdogs have gone 303-251-15 ATS (54.7%) over the past nine NCAA Tournaments combined. So, playing all favorites would have netted you a 45.3% win percentage that would have bankrupted even the $50 dollar per game player as he would be down $4,115. While I have just shown that underdogs are indeed the best wager, favorites that do win the game straight-up also tend to cover the pointspread. Since 1998, favorites have won straight-up in 396 of the 565 games played, and favorites that have won straight-up have gone 251-133-13 ATS (65.4%). What this also shows is that there have been 169 upsets during those 9 NCAA Tournaments where the underdog has won straight-up.
Seeding Trends:
The two best seeds over the past nine years have been #10 and #12 seeds. Both are hitting at about 58% for all games played during that span, although it should be noted that they have not performed up to expectations over the past 3 seasons with #10 seeds going 7-10-1 ATS in all games played, while #12 seeds have gone 9-9 ATS during this most recent 3-year period. In contrast, the worst performing seed has been the #14 seeds as they are 16-23-1 ATS (41%) followed by #7 seeds going 29-34-1 ATS (46%) over the course of this study. Note that the lowly #16 seed has been a 50/50 proposition at 18-18 ATS, and given that no #16 has ever beat a #1 seed that means that the sexy #1 seeds are also a losing proposition at 18-18 ATS.
Pointspread Range Trends:
There are a couple pointspread ranges that seem to historically be money-making propositions. First, small double digit favorites have underachieved by a wide margin. Namely, favorites priced between -11 and -14 are just 19-33-3 ATS (36.5%) during the past nine tournaments combined. Favorites just below this price range were almost as bad as favorites between -8 and -10.5 were 35-40-2 ATS (46.7%). Therefore, playing on underdogs priced between +8 and +14 would have yielded a record of 73-54-5 ATS (57.5%) over the past nine years.
I also noted a dichotomy between very small favorites and very large favorites. Specifically, be weary of playing small favorites at -3.5 or less, as they were just 70-95-4 ATS (42.4%). On the other hand, do not be afraid to lay heavy chalk because favorites at -14.5 or greater have been a decent 48-42 ATS (53.3%). This, however, these it should be noted that these big favorites of -14.5 or more have not been profitable in either of the past two years going 2-7 ATS in 2005 and 1-4 ATS in 2006.
Conclusion:
Using combinations of the factors outlined above can make for a very profitable March Madness, especially when specific factors above are utilized in specific rounds. For instance, dogs have gone 28-20 ATS in the 2nd round, and small favorites of -3.5 or less are 3-8 ATS in the final three rounds last 3 seasons. Those are just small tidbits of the volumes of information that can be found. A database is useful in helping to uncover situations where NCAA Tournament teams have historically overachieved or underachieved. However, following the simple criteria that I have researched for this paper will give you a good solid footing to start your search.
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