If you have a pulse then you have probably already fill out an NCAA Tournament bracket, and you probably will fill out several more before Thursday. I’m not pretending that I have all the answers, but I’m also not that moron in every pool who makes the painfully stupid picks, either. I don’t win every pool by any means, but I’m usually fairly competitive. I’m not suggesting for a second that I am a genius or a guru. I just follow a few rules to avoid making dumbs mistakes. Here are 10 tips for a winning March Madness bracket. It’s not my fault if you win, but you can send me a cut of the winnings if you do.
1. Upsets are for losers. This is the hardest thing for most people to get into their minds. There were only three games last year that could legitimately be called upsets. There were many more the year before, of course, but it doesn’t matter – picking upsets is the way to lose. sadly, the best way to win a bracket is to be conservative and dull. Even if you manage to pick a crazy upset and that team wins a game or two it doesn’t ultimately do you much good because that team will be knocked out before they can earn serious points. On the flip side, if you go out on a limb and call a big upset and it doesn’t happen then everyone else will be earning points from the favorite team as they move through the tournament and you will be left behind.
2. Focus on the Final Four. Unless your bracket has a crazy scoring system, pools are won or lost in the Final Four. Your goal above all else has to be to look at which teams have a legitimate shot of making it through to the third weekend. It makes sense, then, to start there and work backwards.
3. Be loyal to the top two seeds. The one and two seeds earned that distinction for a reason, and they are rewarded for their accomplishments by facing the easiest possible tournament run (not that anything is easy about the tournament). You need to have a good reason to pick an upset for one of these teams. If there isn’t a good reason then assume they won’t lose. Only one championship game since 1989 hasn’t had at least one team from the top two seeds.
4. Be superstitious if you want to. The last nine champions have all come from the Eastern time zone. This proves nothing, of course, but superstition plays as much a part in a winning bracket as anything. If you’re more of a color person, then every team since 1987 has had blue on their uniforms.
5. Skip the bottom four seeds. A 12 seed can occasionally do some damage. No team below that is likely to. The 13s and lower are stuck at the bottom for a reason – they are the winners of lousy tournaments and the flawed teams from major conferences. They also play the best teams in the tournament. Crazy things can happen, but there is absolutely no percentage in betting that they will. If this sounds redundant that’s only because it is so important that I need to keep saying it until you get it.
6. Stick with the power conferences. The winner is going to come out of the ACC, Big 12, Big East, Big Ten, Pac-10 or SEC. The only time that hasn’t happened in more than 20 years is in 1990 with UNLV. The Running Rebels were incredibly dominant that year. There are some good mid-majors this year, but none anywhere close to UNLV. Picking a team outside of the big six to win it all is an unnecessary risk.
7. Look for scoring teams. At least 20 of the last 23 winners have averaged at least 76 points per game during the regular season. They have also won their regular season games by an average of at least 10 points. Defense may win championships, but not if a team can’t score at will.
8. Coaching experience matters. A team that wins is a team that is coached by a seasoned veteran. Virtually every winner over the last three decades has been coached by a coach that has taken a team to the tournament at least four times in the past. Don’t get overly excited by Drake, in other words.
9. Pay attention to the conference tournaments. Seven of the last ten winners also won their conference tournaments. If you think that that is significant then you can narrow your search down to just six teams – North Carolina, Kansas, Pitt, Wisconsin, UCLA and Georgia. You can be pretty confident that Georgia won’t win it, too.
10. Have fun. Picking a winning bracket requires luck more than anything else. If you take it all too seriously you’re just opening your self up for mockery.
