Props, futures and picks, oh my!: Navigating the NC betting world during March Madness

When lawmakers approved a March 11 launch date for sports gambling in North Carolina, it could have been viewed as a favor to the basketball lovers in the state.

It actually wasn’t.

With 362 teams competing in Division I, there are market advantages to be found in the regular season of college basketball. The postseason? There’s a reason it’s called “madness.”

And if you think picking the bracket without the point spread is a challenge, well, gambling on the games with the lines increases the degree of difficulty exponentially.

Think about it like a simple math problem. There are 68 teams in the field. The oddsmakers can throw out 80 percent of the teams in Division I and hone in on 36 first-round games.

Meanwhile, in Las Vegas, they keep building casinos, and they keep getting fancier. That’s not by accident. The house always wins.

Brave new world of prop bets

But with the advent of sports gambling apps, there are more ways to bet on the tournament than just by placing “straight bets” (with the point spread) on the game or on the total (over/under the total number of combined points the two teams are predicted to score).

Player “proposition bets” are actually where you can find an edge on the oddsmakers. Apps like Draft Kings, Fan Duel and Bet MGM make it easier than ever to bet on individual stats like points, rebounds and assists.

The best thing to do is look around your app of choice and see what they offer. Then try to apply the knowledge you have of a particular team. If you’re a North Carolina fan, you would expect guard Cormac Ryan to bounce back from an off outing in the ACC tournament championship loss to NC State. Ryan had eight points against the Wolfpack. His points total is set at 10.5 (with -125 odds on Draft Kings) for Thursday’s first-round matchup with Wagner.

That means if you bet $125, you would win $100 if Ryan scores more than 10 points. The odds, or the “juice,” at -125 are shaded higher than the standard -110. That indicates that the oddsmaker (or “book”) thinks it’s more likely. There are dozens of prop bets like that on UNC, Duke, NC State and your favorite team if you sift through on the apps.

Futures

If you just take straight bets, either on the spread or totals, you have to win 52.4 percent to be profitable. There’s some patience involved there that gamblers (new and old) often don’t have to grind out.

“Futures bets” offer a higher yield but also require a team to win outright and not just cover the spread. You might fail to pick the perfect bracket, or go 17-15 in the first round (to yield a $50 profit at $100 per bet), but you can also pick a team to either win the whole tournament, or to reach the Final Four.

These payouts can vary from large (+7500 on a longshot like McNeese State) to short (+260). Using $100 as the standard bet, if former LSU coach Will Wade were to lead McNeese to the Final Four out of the Midwest region, you’d net $7,500.

UNC, even as the top seed, is actually not the favorite in the West region (Arizona +200 is). A $100 bet would give you $260 if UNC were to make the Final Four. Given UNC has the easiest of the four regions, and a favorable path, that might be one way to dip your toe into the gambling pool.

First-round picks

Traditional gamblers (read: older ones like me) still prefer to make straight bets. So here are a few picks for the round of 64:

UNC (-24.5) vs. Wagner (Thursday, 2:45 p.m.): It’s normally a good idea to stay away from bigger numbers, but the Tar Heels will be angry after the ACC title loss to NC State and Wagner only has seven healthy players on their roster.

McNeese State (+6.5) vs. Gonzaga (Thursday, 7:25 p.m.): This will be a popular pick but sometimes you just have to go with the crowd. The Zags aren’t what they once were. Wade has the Cowboys grinding on defense (sixth nationally in turnover percentage, according to KenPom) and firing away from the 3-point line (seventh nationally in 3-point percentage).

James Madison (+5.5) vs. Wisconsin (Friday, 9:40 p.m.): Many people overlooked Florida Atlantic and its 31-3 record last year. They figured they were a good team beating up on bad teams in an average league. Turned out they were really good, “Final Four” good even. Guess what JMU’s record is?

Texas A&M (+1.5) vs. Nebraska (Friday, 6:50 p.m.): All of this talk of point spreads and props and numbers, sometimes the easiest thing to do is find a close line and pick a winner. As longtime N&O columnist Caulton Tudor often told me, coaches win in this tournament. Backing Buzz Williams and the Aggies in a coin-toss game is a good idea.