Sam Morris / Las Vegas Sun
Tuesday, March 12, 2013 | 6 p.m.
It doesn’t pay, generally speaking, to bet favorites in college basketball this week.
That should be about as surprising as Kansas winning another conference title or Steve Alford bemoaning the Mountain West tournament being held at the Thomas & Mack Center by now. They call this month madness for a reason.
The upsets that give March its identity come in no greater wave than in the seven top conference tournaments, all of which tip off over the next two days.
Consider that over the past five years, favorites have only covered more than underdogs in one of those conference tournaments — the Pac-12, where favorites have covered 54 percent of the time with a 25-21 record.
That is outweighed by conferences like the ACC, where underdogs are 32-21-3 since 2008 for 60 percent, and the Mountain West, where underdogs have covered 59 percent with a 23-16 clip.
It’s something worth keeping in mind before prancing up to the betting window with a parlay full of chalk. But single games are not the purpose of this post.
Conference-tournament future odds are the subject at hand. Prices to win all of the remaining tournaments from the LVH Superbook are listed below.
Betting favorites to win major conference tournaments hasn’t worked out too well, either. The Big Ten is the only conference where the No. 1 seed has won more than twice in the last five years, as the regular-season champion has prevailed four times.
Things get particularly zany in the Mountain West, SEC and Pac-12. The top team hasn’t captured the Mountain West tournament crown for seven straight years. It’s been a similar five-year drought in the Pac-12, a span where two No. 6 seeds have won.
The average seed to win the SEC tournament over the past five years is No. 5. Finding the right mid-priced team to wager on has been a winning strategy.
I’ll attempt to do that for the 2013 slate below, bolding my favorite bet in each of the seven premier conference tournaments. It’s far from profitable to bet all these tournaments in the long run, so most of these picks aren’t made with much confidence.
As always, I’m looking for spots to extract value and not necessarily going with my pick to win the tournament. For instance, I doubt Minnesota takes the Big Ten trophy in Chicago.
But if the capable Golden Gophers get past Illinois and upset Indiana, which they’ve already done once the season, it sets up hedging potential. And, trust me, it took a good bit of self control, and probably a foolish choice, to not contradict all that I just wrote to take vastly superior Florida as a big favorite to win the SEC.
ACC Tournament
No. 2 seed Duke — -120
No. 1 seed Miami — +225
No. 3 seed North Carolina — +450
No. 5 seed North Carolina State — +550
No. 4 seed Virginia — +900
Field — +1000
Big East Tournament
No. 2 seed Louisville — +125
No. 1 seed Georgetown — +400
No. 4 seed Pittsburgh — +500
No. 5 seed Syracuse — +500
No. 3 seed Marquette — +800
No. 6 seed Notre Dame — +1200
No. 7 seed Villanova — +2000
No. 9 seed Cincinnati — +2000
No. 8 seed Providence — +3000
No. 10 seed Saint John's — +6000
Field — +2500
Big Ten Tournament
No. 1 seed Indiana — +120
No. 2 seed Ohio State — +350
No. 3 seed Michigan State — +400
No. 5 seed Michigan — +400
No. 4 seed Wisconsin — +800
No. 9 seed Minnesota — +2000
No. 6 seed Iowa — +2500
No. 8 seed Illinois — +2500
Field — +2500
Big 12 Tournament
No. 1 seed Kansas — -130
No. 2 seed Kansas State — +400
No. 3 seed Oklahoma State — +500
No. 4 seed Oklahoma — +800
No. 5 seed Iowa State — +800
No. 6 seed Baylor — +800
Field — +1500
Mountain West Tournament
No. 3 seed UNLV — +150
No. 1 seed New Mexico — +200
No. 4 seed San Diego State — +350
No. 2 seed Colorado State — +400
No. 5 seed Boise State — +800
No. 6 seed Air Force — +3000
No. 7 seed Fresno State — +3000
Field — +5000
Pac-12 Tournament
No. 4 seed Arizona — +150
No. 1 seed UCLA — +300
No. 3 seed Oregon — +600
No. 2 seed California — +600
No. 8 seed Stanford — +600
No. 5 seed Colorado — +700
No. 6 seed Washington — +1800
No. 9 seed Arizona State — +1800
Field — +2500
SEC Tournament
No. 1 seed Florida — -200
No. 6 seed Missouri — +600
No. 2 seed Kentucky — +700
No. 3 seed Ole Miss — +1000
No. 4 seed Alabama — +1200
No. 7 seed Arkansas — +1500
No. 5 seed Tennessee — +1800
No. 8 seed Georgia — +3500
No. 9 seed LSU — +3500
No. 10 seed Vanderbilt — +3500
Field — +2000
Atlantic 10 Tournament
No. 1 seed Saint Louis — +200
No. 2 seed Virginia Commonwealth — +200
No. 3 seed Temple — +600
No. 4 seed La Salle — +600
No. 5 seed Butler — +600
Field — +300
Big Sky Tournament
No. 1 seed Montana — -110
No. 2 seed Weber State — -110
Field — +425
Big West Tournament
No. 2 seed Pacific — +225
No. 1 seed Long Beach State — +300
No. 4 seed Cal-Irvine — +350
No. 3 seed Cal Poly — +400
No. 8 seed Cal-State Fullerton — +800
No. 5 seed Hawaii — +800
No. 6 seed Cal Davis — +1000
No. 7 seed Cal Santa Barbara — +1000
Conference USA Tournament
No. 1 seed Memphis — -120
No. 2 seed Southern Miss — +225
No. 3 seed UTEP — +600
No. 5 seed Tulsa — +800
No. 4 seed East Carolina — +1200
Field — +600
Southland Tournament
No. 1 seed Stephen F. Austin — -140
No. 2 seed Northwestern State — +300
No. 3 seed Oral Roberts — +300
No. 4 seed Southeast Louisiana — +1800
Field — +550
WAC Tournament
No. 2 seed Denver — -125
No. 1 seed Louisiana Tech — +350
No. 3 seed New Mexico State — +400
No. 5 seed Utah State — +600
No. 4 seed Texas-Arlington — +1200
No. 6 seed Idaho — +1500
Field — +3000
Case Keefer can be reached at 948-2790 or
[email protected]. Follow Case on Twitter at twitter.com/casekeefer.
Join the Discussion:
Check this out for a full explanation of our conversion to the LiveFyre commenting system and instructions on how to sign up for an account.
Full comments policy