Who will be this years Cinderella teams?
Let’s face it, March Madness is all about betting and making your Bracket picks and seeing how many teams you can get into the final 4 of your bracket. It’s amazing how one team can screw up ¼ of your entire bracket and for some it’s like the end of the world or we’ll utter those 3 little words, “Well, I’m done!”
One thing I love about March Madness is finding that small school who comes out of nowhere and shocks the college basketball world with a magic 3-pointer at the end. How many times have we’ve seen that 3 point specialist from that small school put the boots to that big bad popular College or University from the big city?
Therefore, I ask you this? How do you handicap your March Madness brackets from a point spread point of view? In fact, how do you find value in these small schools? I love playing with formulas or finding theories to see how they make out and here’s what I did this year to find that golden school. Before I started, I said; “ok what’s the most important factors I found watching past March Madness games that were key to the end results?” I came up with 3 key facts;
· Players who average 15 points or more a game
· 3-point shooters are key in the last 3 minutes
· Players who average more then 5 rebounds per game
So, I went to each school stats page and if a team had a player who average more than 15 points a game, I gave them 1 point, if they had a player who average more than 40% in their 3 point shooting but average at least 3 attempts a game, I gave them a point. Then for rebounding, what I did was give 1-point to any player who average more than 5 rebounds per game. Here’s what I found and you will see there’s some great value in some of these schools.
The lowest score was 1-point and 3 schools fit this mold, including Gonzaga who’s made a nice run in the last 5 to 7 years in the dance. The other two schools were Mount St. Mary’s who faces North Carolina (Yikes! 5 points) and Winthrop who faces Washington State who scored 4 points.
Instead of listing all of the team’s scores, I will just list the 9 top teams who scored 6 points or more and who they are facing with their score:
Notre Dame -6.5 (7 points) vs. George Mason (3 points)
Boise St. +13 (6 points) vs. Louisville (3 points)
Vanderbilt -6.5 (6 points) vs. Siena (5 points)
Davidson -2 (6 points) vs. Gonzaga (1 point)
Temple +7 (6 points) vs. Michigan St. (3 points)
Kentucky +6 (6 points) vs. Marquette (2 points)
BYU +2 (7 points) vs. Texas A&M (3 Points)
Xavier -8.5 (6 points) vs. Georgia (2 points)
Duke -20 (6 points) vs. Belmont (3 points)
As you can see, Notre Dame and BYU are the top two teams who scored the highest in this “Double R” research and development exercise. However, the value and UPSET SPECIAL potential is with Boise State at +13 vs. Louisville as a 14th seed along with Temple +6 (12 seed) vs. Michigan State stand to be this years Cinderella teams.
Enjoy the Madness friends and get ready to say “well, I’m done!” | 
