The NCAA men’s basketball regular season has entered its stretch run as conference play continues. Most teams have another half dozen conference matchups before playing in their conference tournaments to end the regular season before March Madness begins.
Odds makers released this week an updated futures board for the 2015 NCAA tournament. Three teams now have the same odds in second place. Arizona and Duke were joined this week by Wisconsin with the second best odds for the national title at 8 to 1.
All three trail Kentucky the odds on favorite at 4 to 5. The Wildcats have been at the top of the futures board since the start of the season thanks to such a deep lineup of talent, and remain the only undefeated team in the top 25.
Wisconsin however has won five consecutive games including wins on the road at Iowa and Michigan. The Badgers are 13-1 over their past 14 games overall, with the only blemish an embarrassing loss to Rutgers. Their only other loss of the season was in early December against Duke.
Duke has been on an emotional rollercoaster of sorts. On January 25, the Blue Devils defeated St. John’s to hand their coach his 1,000 win. Since, they have blown a second half lead of 10 points to lose to Notre Dame, kicked Rasheed Sulaimon their sixth man off the team and hand the Virginia Cavaliers their first loss of this season.
In the eyes of odds makers such as Bovada and topbet it has been just a wash, as the Blue Devils odds remained unchanged from this same time last week.
On the other hand, the loss to Duke pushed the Virginia odds for the national title higher to 10 to 1 from last week’s 8 to 1.
The Gonzaga Bulldogs continue to get very little respect in the eyes of odds makers. On most national polls, the Bulldogs are ranked No. 2 with just one loss on the season. However, odds makers such as betonline and sportsbook.com have Gonzalo no higher than tied for fifth with odds of 10 to 1 to win the national title.
2015 NCAA TOURNAMENT TITLE ODDS
KENTUCKY WILDCATS 4 to 5
ARIZONA WILDCATS 8 to 1
DUKE BLUE DEVILS 8 to 1
WISCONSIN BADGERS 8 to 1
VIRGINIA CAVALIERS 10 to 1
GONZAGA BULLDOGS 10 to 1
KANSAS JAYHAWKS 25 to 1
VILLANOVA WILDCATS 30 to 1
LOUISVILLE CARDINALS 30 to 1
NORTH CAROLINA TAR HEELS 35 to 1