March is here. The first conference tournament starts tomorrow. College basketball’s annual moment has arrived.
Does that affect betting markets? We see this sometimes. When there’s enough public money at stake, sportsbooks’ incentives change. They react more to public narratives than to their best bettors’ action. This is how you end up with the Chiefs favored over the Eagles in the Super Bowl.
This early, though, it’s hard to believe we’re going to see wacky markets. There are too many games today, there are too many big games today, and those big games don’t have big-name teams the way they might if Auburn wasn’t so new to the top of the national scene.
So, we’re sticking with two things that have worked for us recently. One over a medium sample, one over a sample size of one.
Texas A&M at Florida
It’s hard to find three performances more disappointing from this week’s weeknight games than those of Iowa State, Texas A&M, and Mississippi. Coincidentally—or maybe not—T.J. Otzelberger, Buzz Williams, and Chris Beard are all receiving public attention regarding the Indiana job, and it’s not impossible there’s contact happening about Texas as well, at least for two of those three. Two years ago, Georgetown’s pursuit of Ed Cooley demonstrated that negotiations start early. Even if there’s no contact at all, that doesn’t mean the ordeal isn’t distracting.
We don’t want to overplay this hand. We might be on to nothing at all. Of the three, Mississippi and Beard seem likeliest to outright crumble. They’re the worst of the trio on paper, their slide is tied with A&M’s as the most pronounced, and there were heavy rumors even last offseason about Beard wanting to leave Oxford as quickly as he could, purportedly thinking poorly of the program’s potential. Mississippi, however, has the easiest draw today, playing Oklahoma at home. If the team is merely struggling for conventional late-season reasons, it’s a prime bounce-back opportunity.
I’m extraordinarily biased when it comes to Iowa State. I like to think Otzelberger isn’t even interested in the Indiana job, wanting to keep running his kingdom rather than taking on potential dysfunction and unrealistic expectations in Bloomington. More objectively, Iowa State’s skid offers the easiest benign explanations: Keshon Gilbert’s out. Curtis Jones was out. Milan Momcilovic was out for a long time. Iowa State’s had skids like this in two of the last three seasons, too, so there might be something going on with training and fatigue. Also, Iowa State’s hosting Arizona, who gutted them in Tucson. If focus is an issue tonight, cancel CyTown.
That leaves us with A&M. We love Buzz Williams, but his teams often hit a ceiling. We’re wary of Todd Golden’s morals, but there’s no doubting his analysis and ability to prepare for games. Florida is one of the best teams in the country, returning home after a bothersome but mostly insignificant loss in Athens. Kenpom has the line at ten, implying at least a tiny edge over where the market places it.
This checks a lot of boxes.
Pick: Florida –9 (–110). 10.00 units to win 9.09.
Missouri at Vanderbilt
We’ve had a good run and then a bad run with overs, with the good run longer than the bad. We’re 12–9 over our last 21 of them, but 0–7 over our last seven.
Of those seven, I’d define four as “bad beats,” drawing the line on that definition at one-possession losses where we at some point led in the live odds by something close to double digits. We shouldn’t have won all four of those, but we probably should have gotten two.
The way I see it, then, is more as a 14–7 trend. This is an arbitrary sample (we weren’t betting many overs before the 12–2 run, but we weren’t winning them at an 86% clip) and it’s not that big. Also, we’re picking these with a lot of subjectivity.
Still, in the absence of some proven market-beating algorithm, the best thing we can do right now is hunt small edges. We still think the overs might be one, and with so many games we’ve picked this week landing within a couple points of the exact kenpom final score, we like that Pomeroy has this total at 163.
Pick: Over 158 (–110). 10.00 units to win 9.09.
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I am only roughly 90% confident in these numbers. We’ll get that Google Sheet up soon which tracks all our bets this year.
2025: –92.51 units (started with 1,000-unit bankroll)
2025: –5% average ROI (weighted by unit; sample size: 108 single-game markets)
Pre-2025: 0% average ROI (worse when limited to only sports)
Units taken from best odds we can find at major sportsbooks available to most Americans.
These bets are not investment advice. If you’re worried you or someone you know might have a gambling addiction, call 1-800-GAMBLER for free, confidential help.
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