March Madness is upon us, with a wave of 32 NCAA Tournament games crashing to shore Thursday and Friday. There are ostensibly 12 hours of action each day. It’s a lot to process. So you might say to yourself: “Self, I could sure use some March Madness betting tips.”
We at Props.com understand. So we picked the brain of Andy Molitor, avid college basketball bettor and director of content at BetSperts, for insights on how to proceed Thursday, Friday – and throughout the Tourney, for that matter.
Without further ado, here are Molitor’s …
Top 3 March Madness Betting Tips
1. Don’t Listen to the Noise
Over the past few days, plenty of TV talking heads and “experts” on social media have blathered about who’s overrated and underrated. They know which team is going to take the big fall on opening weekend.
Molitor pointed to a perfect example from a screenshot he’d saved of an ESPN segment featuring Joe Lunardi, the network’s popular “bracketologist”. Across the bottom of the screen was the headline, an eye-catching prediction: “Coach K’s career comes to end in 2nd round vs. Davidson.”
Mike Krzyzewski, coach of West No. 2 seed Duke, is retiring after 42 years at the helm of the Blue Devils.
“It’s not full-on clickbait, but they know what they’re doing, and I think it should all be taken with a grain of salt,” Molitor said. “Everyone has a bit of a different experience with how they consume [traditional] media and social media. But the competition for your clicks will be strong this week, and you’ll see a lot of big names push narratives that will get people’s attention.”
Molitor added that many of these pundits weren’t even talking college hoops until very recently. But now that NCAA Tournament odds are all the rage, many of those who weren’t paying attention for much of the season think they know it all.
“The entire world is suddenly a college basketball expert,” Molitor said. “People who didn’t catch a game until after the Super Bowl are proclaiming certain teams to be busts or Cinderellas, and it gets really noisy out there. That’s not to say that doing some research or reading some previews from trusted college basketball writers should be avoided. You just don’t want to get talked out of a well-researched, well-thought-out bet because Twitter proclaims a team ‘mushed.’
2. Look Where the Games are Played
This advice relates to teams up and down the bracket, though the higher-seeded teams are often afforded better breaks. While the site generally isn’t a true home court, if the venue is close enough for a strong fan base to get to, it can sure feel like a home game. And that certainly doesn’t benefit opponents.
For example, West No. 1 seed Gonzaga will spend this weekend in Portland, assuming it gets through the opening round. That’s a 5.5-hour drive and a really easy flight from home base in Spokane, Washington. And although Duke is the West’s No. 2 seed, because of the pod structure the NCAA instituted several years ago, the Blue Devils will open in Greenville, South Carolina. That’s less than four hours from campus in Durham, North Carolina.
East No. 1 seed Baylor has it even better, playing in Fort Worth, Texas, a scant 90 minutes from the Waco campus. And Bears fans travel in bunches.
“It’s rare for a team to actually end up in its home arena during the Tournament,” Molitor said. “But there will be spots where one of the teams will likely have a slight advantage, due to proximity to the campus and the size of their fan base.”
But again, it’s not just the No. 1 and 2 seeds enjoying such benefits this year. This element came into play even before the first-round games, with the First Four in Dayton, Ohio. Indiana played and beat Wyoming 66-58 Tuesday night, with the Hoosiers cashing as 4.5-point favorites, and Notre Dame faces Rutgers in the First Four on Wednesday.
“Right off the bat, you have Indiana and Notre Dame in play-in games in nearby Dayton,” Molitor said. “And later in the week, you’ll see smaller schools like South Dakota State and New Mexico State having to travel up to Buffalo to take on Providence and UConn.”
On Thursday, South Dakota State, seeded 13th in the Midwest Region, faces No. 4 seed Providence. Also on Thursday, No. 12 seed New Mexico State meets No. 5 seed Connecticut in a West Region clash.
3. Don’t Forget About the Rest of the Action
The NCAA Tournament is one of the biggest betting events on the American sports calendar. But it’s not the only thing you can bet these next couple of weeks. In fact, it’s not even the only college basketball event on the menu. That’s important to remember, which is why Molitor includes this reminder among his March Madness betting tips: “The NIT [began] Tuesday, and the CBI starts this weekend. It doesn’t have the allure of a 7-10 matchup in the Big Dance, but the money spends the same.”
As is often the case in any sport, motivation can be a big factor. For some of the programs from big-boy conferences, how excited are they to now be relegated to a JV tournament? Teams such as Wake Forest and Florida, for example. And how about schools that just had their NCAA Tournament bubble burst, such as SMU, Xavier, and Dayton? Where is their mindset?
“There can often be big motivational angles in the smaller tournaments, where some bigger programs aren’t quite as excited to be playing as maybe, say, a senior-laden mid-major squad trying to go out on a high note,” Molitor said.