If your NCAA tournament bracket is already a mess, take comfort in this: If you had picked teams to advance based upon who Las Vegas favored in the games, you would have correctly predicted 15 of the 16 third-round teams, according to RJ Bell of Pregame.com.
The only exception is Purdue, which was the smallest of underdogs (-1) vs. Washington. Yes, if the Cinderella tag fits any team, it would be Matt Painter's Boilermakers.
No. 16 seeds are now winless in 100 tries against No. 1 seeds. No. 15 seeds are now 4-96 in round one. No team seeded lower than No. 12 advanced to the third round this year, and of the last 400 Sweet 16 teams, only six have been lower than a No. 12 seed.
The odds against having a perfect bracket after two rounds are 8.7 quadrillion to 1, and none of the over five million participants in the ESPN tournament challenge have a perfect bracket after two rounds.
Here are the updated odds to win the championship:
North Carolina: 5.5 to 1 (18%)
Louisville: 8.5 to 1 (12%)
Pitt: 9 to 1 (11%)
U Conn: 10 to 1 (10%)
Memphis: 11 to 1 (9%)
Duke: 14 to 1 (7%)
Michigan St: 22 to 1 (4.5%)
Syracuse: 22 to 1 (4.5%)
Oklahoma: 22 to 1 (4.5%)
Gonzaga: 22 to 1 (4.5%)
Kansas: 30 to 1 (3.5%)
Villanova: 36 to 1 (3%)
Purdue: 36 to 1 (2.5%)
Arizona: 36 to 1 (2.5%)
Missouri: 50 to 1 (2%)
Xavier: 71 to 1 (1.5%)
RJ Bell notes: "The odds stated above have been adjusted through a proprietary Pregame.com formula to remove the commission charged by sportsbooks. Without this adjustment, the odds against a result are understated substantially (often upwards of 50%). For example, an event whose true odds are 10-1 against will be incorrectly stated as 7-1 against (the difference is the commission charged by the sportsbook). As a result, there is an overstatement of the chances of the event happening. The failure of nearly all widely circulated odds to account for this adjustment makes the numbers unreliable and misleading."
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