College Basketball Thread 2024-25 Season (General)

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SnoopRob said:
I think that they have little impact because they go so late into the selection/seeding process. The Committee starts working on the bracket early in the week and by the time Saturday/Sunday rolls around, most of the decisions have been made.

If folks want the conference tournaments to have a significant impact, the schedule would likely need to be changed so that all conference tournaments end by Friday night.
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Or have the show Monday
 
aGDevil2k said:
I don't like Florida, Alabama, Auburn or Tennessee

All 4 have very much dislikable characteristics or corrupt coaches
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Hickory’s own Rick Barnes isn’t as bad as Pearl or Oates IMHO. Yeah he was a prick to Dean at Clemson… but other than that I can’t think of anything as egregious as Pearl and Oates. Unless I’m missing something. I don’t know anything about the Fla coach. He looks like a kid I coached in middle school about 12 years ago… and of course none are as detestable as Krat.
 
“After reporting that they lost more money than usual during the most recent NFL season and last year’s March Madness, sportsbooks like DraftKings and Flutter Entertainment’s FLUT FanDuel hope to be more profitable during this year’s “Big Dance.”

And there will be a lot of money at play. An estimated $3.1 billion is expected to be legally wagered on the men’s and women’s college basketball tournaments this year, a 14.81% increase from $2.7 billion in 2024, according to the American Gaming Association, a gambling-industry group. That figure is more than double the $1.39 billion estimated to have been wagered on 2025’s Super Bowl LIX.

Sportsbooks hope to keep hundreds of millions of the dollars being wagered on the basketball tournaments, particularly given the companies’ poor performances during the most recent NFL season. …

… While the $3.1 billion in bets will be a record, the total amount wagered on March Madness will be even higher than estimates show, because those only account for legal wagers made through licensed sportsbooks. Illegal wagers made through offshore unlicensed sportsbooks, as well as bets made through office pools or squares contests, should take the total amount much higher. …”

 
“… Duke University’s Cooper Flagg is widely expected to be the first overall pick in the 2025 NBA draft, but he’s already making millions of dollars as a college basketball player. Flagg has an estimated name, image and likeness value of $4.8 million, the highest in college basketball, according to On3’s NIL tracker. Flagg was injured last week and his status for the tournament remains unclear.

Louisiana State University guard Flau’jae Johnson is the top NIL earner entering the women’s March Madness tournament, at $1.5 million. …

… Teams in the women’s bracket will be paid for playing March Madness games this year for the first time, as men’s teams have been for decades. Women’s teams — not individual players — will be splitting winnings that total $200 million less than the men’s teams will receive. …”


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All of the betting, and the total amounts, are a huge red flag for some kid or group of kids to throw a game. Let’s face it, if you play D1 ball and you don’t make squat compared to Col Flagg… and some “fixer” approaches you with promises of 7 figures to throw a game…
Great googly-moogly, I’d put those odds pretty good that “Johnny” may take the money and run. Enter the portal and go to a different team… leave the school behind who you’ve just shat upon with your missed FT’s and your fouling a 3pt shooter in the waning seconds… or stepping into the lane for a FT violation.

We’re fools to think this type of stuff won’t happen, or hasn’t happened.

If you’re the 2nd best player on the team, and the best player makes 10x the NIL you do, and you’re looking to portal out anyway, and the mobster comes at you with serious coin… shit… Katy bar that damn door. The fix is in.
 
nycfan said:
“… Duke University’s Cooper Flagg is widely expected to be the first overall pick in the 2025 NBA draft, but he’s already making millions of dollars as a college basketball player. Flagg has an estimated name, image and likeness value of $4.8 million, the highest in college basketball, according to On3’s NIL tracker. Flagg was injured last week and his status for the tournament remains unclear.

Louisiana State University guard Flau’jae Johnson is the top NIL earner entering the women’s March Madness tournament, at $1.5 million. …

… Teams in the women’s bracket will be paid for playing March Madness games this year for the first time, as men’s teams have been for decades. Women’s teams — not individual players — will be splitting winnings that total $200 million less than the men’s teams will receive. …”


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I heard this number before. Does that assume that a 16 beating a 1 is as equally likely as a 1 beating a 16?

I think it does, which is just bad probability. If you odds weighted it, it would probably be in the trillions or quadrillion range, not quintillion.
 
Calheel said:
I heard this number before. Does that assume that a 16 beating a 1 is as equally likely as a 1 beating a 16?

I think it does, which is just bad probability. If you odds weighted it, it would probably be in the trillions or quadrillion range, not quintillion.
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I doubt it would make that much difference. Until the sweet 16, 1 seeds have a very high probability of winning. So do 2 and 3 seeds in the first round. After that, I don't think odds weighting would have much impact. I could buy quadrillion range, but 90 trillion is 5 orders of magnitude less than 9 quadrillion.

For instance, let's suppose all 1-16 matchups are 1 seed wins -- just take them out of the bracket entirely. That would have an order of magnitude effect, not 5.

Edit: if they were equal weighting the games, the odds of a perfect bracket would be 147 quintillion. So the 9 quintillion number is a step down, so it's applying some sort of weighting.
 
Centerpiece said:
Hickory’s own Rick Barnes isn’t as bad as Pearl or Oates IMHO. Yeah he was a prick to Dean at Clemson… but other than that I can’t think of anything as egregious as Pearl and Oates. Unless I’m missing something. I don’t know anything about the Fla coach. He looks like a kid I coached in middle school about 12 years ago… and of course none are as detestable as Krat.
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yeah, somehow Tennessee is definitely the most likeable of that group.

the florida coach todd golden is accused of harassment/sexual misconduct by multiple women. no thank you.
 
Went through my bracket...which is usually my best.
Had Duke, Auburn, Tennessee and St Johns in the FF...very chalky.
 
superrific said:
I doubt it would make that much difference. Until the sweet 16, 1 seeds have a very high probability of winning. So do 2 and 3 seeds in the first round. After that, I don't think odds weighting would have much impact. I could buy quadrillion range, but 90 trillion is 5 orders of magnitude less than 9 quadrillion.

For instance, let's suppose all 1-16 matchups are 1 seed wins -- just take them out of the bracket entirely. That would have an order of magnitude effect, not 5.

Edit: if they were equal weighting the games, the odds of a perfect bracket would be 147 quintillion. So the 9 quintillion number is a step down, so it's applying some sort of weighting.
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Thanks. That makes sense.

Now I’m curious how they came up with the 9.7 quintillion number and what assumptions they were making.

Seed is still a significant differentiator in the sweet 16 and beyond. A no. 1 seed is about twice as likely as a 2 seed of making the final four, and four times as likely to win it all.

History of Records By Seed in the NCAA Tournament

Odds, records, and history by seeding for March Madness tournament to help find upsets in this year's bracket.
www.betfirm.com
 
4thgenheel said:
yeah, somehow Tennessee is definitely the most likeable of that group.

the florida coach todd golden is accused of harassment/sexual misconduct by multiple women. no thank you.
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That sounds like the middle schooler I coached 12 years ago. He was a little shit then too.
 
Calheel said:
Thanks. That makes sense.

Now I’m curious how they came up with the 9.7 quintillion number and what assumptions they were making.

Seed is still a significant differentiator in the sweet 16 and beyond. A no. 1 seed is about twice as likely as a 2 seed of making the final four, and four times as likely to win it all.

History of Records By Seed in the NCAA Tournament

Odds, records, and history by seeding for March Madness tournament to help find upsets in this year's bracket.
www.betfirm.com
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I don't know. If I have time for a little break later I will try to reconstruct.

If you look closely at that chart, you'll see that a primary differentiator between 1 seeds and 2 seeds making the final four comes in the first two rounds. If you impute probabilities, the 1 seed wins its S16 game about 73% of the time; the two seed about 67%. I thought it would be less than that, but it's still not going to have a huge impact on the odds of getting a perfect bracket.

Other than the first two rounds, 1 seeds also have a big advantage in the Final Four. But that's not at all helpful for our purposes because it doesn't tell you which of the 1 seeds will win if two play in the first game.

*****
After a bit more look at the data, the low quadrillions estimate might not be wrong. If all games were a 60% likelihood, then we'd have basically 1 in a quadrillion. I'd have to do more calculations to see how accurate that is, but of the first round games, only the 8/9 is less than 60%. As you get further in, there are more 50/50 games (such as the second round game for 4 and 5 seeds, and 3/6 is surprisingly close, about 55% by my eyeball). Of course, it's not linear -- more variation in the probabilities lengthens the odds, so using a mere arithmetic mean isn't going to get the right answer.

Also, I was earlier using the wrong number of games (it's 63 in the regular tourney, not 64) so that throws things off just a bit.
 
Seems like the strongest group of 1 seeds we’ve had in a while

Good 2s too. It’s that 3-6 range that feels fairly weak
 
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