NCAA Talking about Expanding the Sportsbook Tournament. Sportsbook action doesn’t get much better than the men’s college basketball tournament. It is called March Madness and it is hugely popular in terms of sportsbook online odds. If the NCAA gets its way it might get even more popular at the sportsbook as they are talking about expanding from 64 teams to as many as 96.
Sportsbook won’t see any changes in this year’s tournament but it probably won’t be long before there are changes. Many coaches and people inside college basketball like the idea of a bigger tournament. Sportsbook online stats have 347 teams in Division I college basketball and the bigger tournament makes sense for a number of reasons. The TV networks would love more games and the fans are going to like it as well. “If you’re talking about adding more teams, I don’t think the games would change a bit,” Texas Tech coach Pat Knight said. “They’d be just as competitive and I think you’d see more Cinderella stories, more teams people didn’t think had a chance and there’d be a lot more upsets if the NCAA expanded the tournament.”
Some are going to argue that a bigger field makes the regular season less important at the sportsbook but that argument really hasn’t held water so far and it is unlikely it would if they expanded from 64 to 96 teams. Duke’s head coach would at least like to see the regular season conference champs rewarded though. “That would add more relevance to the regular season, instead of just having big games being bracket busters and things like that. I could see it going to 96, but if they do, I would like to see the regular season champs rewarded. Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said, “That would give the conferences who don’t get more than one bid a chance to have two bids. If you expand, you would want that to happen.”
Sportsbook stats indicated that just 18 percent of all college basketball teams get into the tournament. Another 9 percent get into the NIT as sportsbook online numbers show. That is well below the sportsbook percentages for the other sports. Even with expansion, sportsbook stats have college hoops lower than in college football where more than half the teams get a bowl bid.
The decision will ultimately be all about money. Sportsbook online indicates that CBS has the current contract with the NCAA but that can end after this season. The NCAA is not telling anyone anything other than they are discussing expanding the tournament.