On Monday, my colleague Carl Bialik looked at the odds of taking $1 billion out of Warren Buffett’s wallet by completing a perfect NCAA tournament bracket. They’re not good. The simplest way to estimate your chances is by assuming that the outcome of each game is equivalent to a coin flip. There are 63 games […]
Before any games have tipped off, the NCAA tournament already has an almost surefire winner: Warren Buffett. As you’ve likely heard, the billionaire investor is backing a prize of $1 billion to anyone who correctly picks the winner of every game in the men’s college basketball tournament. Announced on Jan. 21, the contest grabbed far […]
Before any games have tipped off, the NCAA tournament already has an almost surefire winner: Warren Buffett. As you’ve likely heard, the billionaire investor is backing a prize of $1 billion to anyone who correctly picks the winner of every game in the men’s college basketball tournament. Announced on Jan. 21, the contest grabbed far […]
This year’s N.C.A.A. tournament has not featured all that many great games — with some exceptions, like Michigan’s come-from-behind win against Kansas on Friday. The flip side is that the four teams that remain have all played exceptionally well, often dominating their opponents. Louisville won its first four games by an average of 22 points — the same margin by which it beat Duke on Sunday. Syracuse has won by 20 points, on average. Michigan’s margin of victory has averaged 16 points, despite the close call against Kansas. Even Wichita State, which has a chance to become the most poorly seeded team ever to win the tournament (and probably the least likely, statistically), has won its games by an average...
Matt Slocum/Associated Press Georgetown is among the Big East’s seven nonfootball members that could thrive in a new conference. A variety of reports suggest that the seven Big East schools that do not compete in high-level football may split off to form their own basketball-centric athletic conference. Georgetown, Villanova, St. John’s, Marquette, Providence, Seton Hall and DePaul share a history of relatively successful men’s basketball programs, along with a heritage as Roman Catholic colleges. They have more in common with one another than they do with the other members of the Big East, which has diluted its basketball brand in its effort to remain intact as an elite football conference. A conference composed of these seven teams, along with select...
