Who The Experts (And President Obama) Are Picking To Win The NCAA Tournament
March Madness is upon us, and with it, the bracket challenges. If you're still mulling over your picks, we broke down what the top experts think will happen. You can find the full expert picks here: ESPN; Sports Illustrated; CBS Sports. Here's how they picked:
Final Four
Out of 14 different teams predicted, four were clearly the consensus favorites among experts:
Michigan State (2 seed)
ESPN: 97% of experts
Sports Illustrated: 100%
CBS Sports: 77%
Kansas (1 seed)
ESPN: 74% of experts
Sports Illustrated: 90%
CBS Sports: 92%
Oklahoma (2 seed)
ESPN: 58% of experts
Sports Illustrated: 90%
CBS Sports: 69%
North Carolina (1 seed)
ESPN: 41% of experts
Sports Illustrated: 80%
CBS Sports: 46%
The dark horse: Kentucky (4 seed)1
ESPN: 32% of experts
Sports Illustrated: 0%
CBS Sports: 30%
National Champion
Just as the experts were pretty set on four teams for the Final Four, it's a two horse race in the final, with Michigan State edging out Kansas:
Michigan State (2 seed)
ESPN: 58% of experts
Sports Illustrated: 40%
CBS Sports: 46%
Kansas (1 seed)
ESPN: 32% of experts
Sports Illustrated: 40%
CBS Sports: 31%
Meanwhile, not quite making the cut:
Oklahoma (2 seed)
ESPN: 3.2% of experts
Sports Illustrated: 0%
CBS Sports: 8%
North Carolina (1 seed)
ESPN: 3.2% of experts
Sports Illustrated: 20%
CBS Sports: 15%
If you're still looking for answers, a sports statistician from FiveThirtyEight stopped by to answer some bracket questions earlier.
POTUS Pick 'Em
While he's not an expert, per se, it's a yearly tradition for the President to fill out a bracket — here's President Obama's try this year:
It's disappointingly low on upset picks, featuring 1-seed Kansas defeating 1-seed North Carolina in the final. Obama only differs from the experts' consensus in picking Texas A&M over Oklahoma in the West Region.
It is interesting to note that 7-seed Oregon State, the loser in his biggest upset pick — to 10-seed VCU — used to employ Obama's brother-in-law Craig Robinson as head coach.
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Bracket questions answered by FiveThirtyEight's sports statistician
