The reality with any spread sport (NFL, NBA, CFB and CBK) is this: the team who wins the game also covers the spread 76 percent of the time. Considering that there are a total of 63 games from start to finish in the Big Dance, the thinking is if you pick all the winners you could expect to finish with a 49-14 ATS record. That is not a bad years work.
Following that train of thought, the obvious key to picking all 63 winners is being able to identify the underdogs who win outright. These "upsets" have a 100 percent ATS rate, which would account for a heavy portion of your 49-14 record. Many of you may recall when we first made our proprietary T-Ratings public back in 1998.
The key to our remarkable Madness run in 1998 was our ability to identify West Virginia in key upsets over seventh-ranked Temple and second-ranked Cincinnati. Washington defeated sixth-ranked Xavier, Detroit downed seventh-ranked St.John?s and Rhode Island beat top-ranked Kansas. Had we failed to identify those upsets, we may have struggled through the tourney trying to stay above water.
Given the importance of Big Dance "upsets," let's reverse engineer the process and see if we can't narrow down the window of opportunity where these golden eggs may be found. Remember, if we can identify the 63 winners then we can expect an overall record of approximately 49-14.
So let's keep it simple at this stage and make it our sole pursuit to identify the 63 winners. We'll start with the raw data, the numeric truths which may assist us in this pursuit.
To start with, we can examine the seed history of the tournament (dating back to '85 when the tourney expanded to 64 teams). That tells us that 16th seeds are 0-68, while 15th seeds are 4-64 making a combined 4-132 record dating back to 1979.
That tells us that we are reasonably safe in assuming that all first and second seeds will survive the first round. That takes the burden of 63 games down to 55.
Fourteenth seeds are 15-53 and 13th seeds are 17-51, giving them a combined record of 32-104. They pull an upset once in every four attempts. So it would be reasonable to expect that if we stayed with all eight of the third and fourth seeds, we would end up with six of eight straight up winners in round 1.
There are four 13-14 seeds this year getting just single digits to open the tournament. Tulsa, Manhattan, Western Kentucky and San Diego are all capped within two to three baskets of their third and fourth seed opponents.
Now, of the 32 13th and 14th seeds to win a first-round match, only five have gone on to win in the second round. So if we assume that two teams get by the first round, then we could also reasonably expect to win both of our second round games by betting against them in round two.
That eliminates the burden of 10 games, reducing us to 45 more games to deal with and accepting two losses. Note, all five 13 and 14 seeds to advance were conference champions. An at-large bid has never pulled an upset from the 13/14-hole and gone on to win in the second round.
That brings us to the fifth through 12th seeds also known as the land of upsets. Thanks to technical analysis, we know a thing or two about the nature of these upsets. There are two ways to get to the Big Dance, you can earn it by winning your conference or you can get there as an "at large" bid.
For starters, an accurate set of Power Ratings is a must-have tool. When the teams are seeded, they are done so by the NCAA RPI that addresses wins and losses but is not as accurate as those used in the gaming industry. After the NCAA seeds the tourney, do your own seeding and identify teams who are improperly seeded and thus offer a great amount of value in the numbers. This type of mis-seeding will account for two more first round upsets, leaving 43 games to work with.
Now, six out of every seven occasions an upset coming from properly seeded matchups. That happens when an automatic bid rises to the occasion and upsets an at-large bid. The notion that "it doesn't matter how you got here" is nonsense. Character teams who were good enough to win their conference tournaments are ALWAYS more dangerous than those invited through the good ol' boys network. In every sense of the word, astute handicappers know that the conference tournaments are an "audition" for the main event.
Moreover, there is a very high percentage of "upsets" when two "at large" bids face each other. The underdog will pull the upset nearly 50 percent of the time when two top-ranked (top 32) "at large" teams face each other. So when searching for upsets, look for them when two at-large bids meet. When teams who are seeded ninth through 12th are the teams who earned bids versus favored teams who are "at large" bids.
More seeding notes:
A one-seed has won 11 titles and finished second seven times since 1985, but all four number-one seeds have never made the Final Four.
If you totaled the seeds from the Final Four last year, you would get nine (two one seeds, a number two and a number five). That is the norm, it has been above 12 just five times.
There have been 20 teams with records of .500 or worse. They have never won a game in the field of 64. (Note: A losing team did win in the play-in game in 2003 when UNC-Asheville defeated Texas-Southern).
Only two teams (North Carolina and Wisconsin in 2000) have made the Final Four with 13 losses or more.
No seed lower than eight (Villanova in 1985) has won a national title since they started seeding teams in 1979.
No five or seven seeds has ever won a national title.
There have only been two teams seeded lower than eighth to make a Final Four.
Following that train of thought, the obvious key to picking all 63 winners is being able to identify the underdogs who win outright. These "upsets" have a 100 percent ATS rate, which would account for a heavy portion of your 49-14 record. Many of you may recall when we first made our proprietary T-Ratings public back in 1998.
The key to our remarkable Madness run in 1998 was our ability to identify West Virginia in key upsets over seventh-ranked Temple and second-ranked Cincinnati. Washington defeated sixth-ranked Xavier, Detroit downed seventh-ranked St.John?s and Rhode Island beat top-ranked Kansas. Had we failed to identify those upsets, we may have struggled through the tourney trying to stay above water.
Given the importance of Big Dance "upsets," let's reverse engineer the process and see if we can't narrow down the window of opportunity where these golden eggs may be found. Remember, if we can identify the 63 winners then we can expect an overall record of approximately 49-14.
So let's keep it simple at this stage and make it our sole pursuit to identify the 63 winners. We'll start with the raw data, the numeric truths which may assist us in this pursuit.
To start with, we can examine the seed history of the tournament (dating back to '85 when the tourney expanded to 64 teams). That tells us that 16th seeds are 0-68, while 15th seeds are 4-64 making a combined 4-132 record dating back to 1979.
That tells us that we are reasonably safe in assuming that all first and second seeds will survive the first round. That takes the burden of 63 games down to 55.
Fourteenth seeds are 15-53 and 13th seeds are 17-51, giving them a combined record of 32-104. They pull an upset once in every four attempts. So it would be reasonable to expect that if we stayed with all eight of the third and fourth seeds, we would end up with six of eight straight up winners in round 1.
There are four 13-14 seeds this year getting just single digits to open the tournament. Tulsa, Manhattan, Western Kentucky and San Diego are all capped within two to three baskets of their third and fourth seed opponents.
Now, of the 32 13th and 14th seeds to win a first-round match, only five have gone on to win in the second round. So if we assume that two teams get by the first round, then we could also reasonably expect to win both of our second round games by betting against them in round two.
That eliminates the burden of 10 games, reducing us to 45 more games to deal with and accepting two losses. Note, all five 13 and 14 seeds to advance were conference champions. An at-large bid has never pulled an upset from the 13/14-hole and gone on to win in the second round.
That brings us to the fifth through 12th seeds also known as the land of upsets. Thanks to technical analysis, we know a thing or two about the nature of these upsets. There are two ways to get to the Big Dance, you can earn it by winning your conference or you can get there as an "at large" bid.
For starters, an accurate set of Power Ratings is a must-have tool. When the teams are seeded, they are done so by the NCAA RPI that addresses wins and losses but is not as accurate as those used in the gaming industry. After the NCAA seeds the tourney, do your own seeding and identify teams who are improperly seeded and thus offer a great amount of value in the numbers. This type of mis-seeding will account for two more first round upsets, leaving 43 games to work with.
Now, six out of every seven occasions an upset coming from properly seeded matchups. That happens when an automatic bid rises to the occasion and upsets an at-large bid. The notion that "it doesn't matter how you got here" is nonsense. Character teams who were good enough to win their conference tournaments are ALWAYS more dangerous than those invited through the good ol' boys network. In every sense of the word, astute handicappers know that the conference tournaments are an "audition" for the main event.
Moreover, there is a very high percentage of "upsets" when two "at large" bids face each other. The underdog will pull the upset nearly 50 percent of the time when two top-ranked (top 32) "at large" teams face each other. So when searching for upsets, look for them when two at-large bids meet. When teams who are seeded ninth through 12th are the teams who earned bids versus favored teams who are "at large" bids.
More seeding notes:
A one-seed has won 11 titles and finished second seven times since 1985, but all four number-one seeds have never made the Final Four.
If you totaled the seeds from the Final Four last year, you would get nine (two one seeds, a number two and a number five). That is the norm, it has been above 12 just five times.
There have been 20 teams with records of .500 or worse. They have never won a game in the field of 64. (Note: A losing team did win in the play-in game in 2003 when UNC-Asheville defeated Texas-Southern).
Only two teams (North Carolina and Wisconsin in 2000) have made the Final Four with 13 losses or more.
No seed lower than eight (Villanova in 1985) has won a national title since they started seeding teams in 1979.
No five or seven seeds has ever won a national title.
There have only been two teams seeded lower than eighth to make a Final Four.
