In the same way that Alabama dominates college football there is a list of perennial favorites in college hoops. At the beginning of the 2018-19 season the favorites included Duke, Kentucky, Kansas, North Carolina and defending champion Villanova. More emphatically these are blue blood power names that are at or near the top of the college basketball betting futures board each season. Accordingly, it’s a good time to review factors to consider for the 2018-19 campaign.
Types of Gamblers
College basketball has two classes of gamblers that participate. First there are the hard-core college hoops gamblers that eat the sport up and spend a considerable amount of time on research. Balanced against that is the casual betting public that could also be called “March Madness Warriors.” Indeed, these are gamblers that focus on the national tournament each spring. To call this second group “chalky” would be an understatement. In fact, these are the folks that drive up the price on big name marquee programs. To oppose these shallow bettors is your first step towards success.
Duke
Duke opened at 5/1 to win the national championship this season. Certainly, the Blue Devils bring plenty of ability as a consistently top performing program. But offsetting that is all of the casual money that floods in on them for the futures board. Specifically, even if Duke is a bona fide chalk to win it all they will not offer full value. Account of all of the easy money from non-hard-core fans that lack knowledge depth for college basketball betting.
Kentucky
Actually Kentucky 11/2, Gonzaga 15/2, Kansas 17/2, North Carolina 10/1, and Villanova 10/1 are all likely to be overpriced. Even though they are undeniably the strongest teams heading into the season. In brief it’s like paying for a car that depreciates once it leaves the lot. Even if it’s a great car its never at its actual true sales value.
Finding True Value
Which of course leads into the question that gamblers constantly confront during the entire college basketball season. Correlate the battle of finding true value against overlays. In like manner its important to assess how much casual public betting has influenced the line. Sure, you can sometimes get away with paying to much with the betting line. It follows that you can even win more than you lose doing that in the short run. However, in the long run your bankroll cannot last.
Power Rating Guide
In turn the most important guide to begin the college basketball season is a power ratings guide. There are several good websites that can provide accurate power ratings to help you find true value and avoid overlays. Besides that, you should closely monitor line moves in college basketball. Not withstanding other sports college basketball line moves can often be the most revealing of any sport. That is because for as much ignorant public money that there is in college hoops there is also plenty of sharp cash. Of major concern is when the sharps pounce.
Line Movers
Owing to the small but significant amount of intelligent money in college hoops line moves are often a great tell. Regardless you don’t want to wait too long to for the moves as a move of several points will likely be too late to be of value. Conversely there are times you’ll want to fade larger moves and take the enhanced value.