FAQs
The NCAA said the odds of a perfect 63-game bracket can be as high as 1 in 9.2 quintillion. Those odds are in play if every game was a coin flip – or a fair 50/50 shot. The amount of different possible outcomes comes out to exactly 9,223,372,036,854,775,808, according to the NCAA.
What happens if you win the bracket challenge? ›
Contestants in the NCAA's Bracket Challenge Sweepstakes can win two tickets to the 2025 men's Final Four, included in a four-night trip, and two tickets to next year's championship game, plus $1,500 in cash toward airfare and $750 in spending money—the NCAA offers the same prize for contestants betting on the women's ...
How do you score the NCAA bracket challenge? ›
As the games progress, you'll get points for every winner you picked correctly. Those points increase every round (games in the second round are worth twice as much as games in the first round, and so on). At the end of the tournament, the player in each group with the most points wins that group.
How many people did the NCAA bracket challenge? ›
It's another year without a perfect NCAA Tournament bracket. Surprising wins by Yale, Oakland and Duquesne busted many of the more than 22 million brackets entered in the largest contest, ESPN's Tournament Challenge, and the last three fell on Friday night when James Madison beat Wisconsin 72-61.
Has anyone ever filled out a perfect NCAA bracket? ›
NO ONE HAS EVER picked a verified perfect NCAA men's bracket, and it's probably not going to happen in our lifetime, or the lifetime of our kids, or their kids, or their kids.
Are any NCAA brackets still perfect? ›
The last verifiably perfect men's NCAA bracket busted in 2023 when No. 16 FDU stunned No. 1 Purdue — only the second time a 16 beat a 1 in men's history. That came on the 25th game.
How many people have won a perfect bracket? ›
There has never been a verified perfect bracket, according to the NCAA. The organization has been tracking online submissions across platforms since 2016 and used archival data before that.
How rare is it to get a perfect March Madness bracket? ›
If you flipped a coin for every game in the NCAA Men's Division I College Basketball Tournament the odds of a perfect bracket are astronomical. It would be about 1 in 9.2 quintillion.
How much money do you get if you win the NCAA bracket? ›
Not only will a perfect bracket win $1 billion (or split it if there's somehow more than one, if any), but the top 20 imperfect brackets will each receive $100,000 for their efforts. If you win the contest, you'll have to accept either 40 annual payments of $25 million or a $500 million lump sum payout.
How does NCAA bracket selection work? ›
The selection process is based on a variety of factors, such as a team's strength of schedule during the regular season, the quality of its wins — such as whether the wins came on the road or at home, and how the team performed statistically, both on the offensive and defensive end.
“No one's had a perfect bracket,” said Brandon Banes, an assistant math professor at Lipscomb University. According to the NCAA, the longest verifiable streak of correct picks in an NCAA tournament bracket to start the March Madness tournament is 49, a mark that was established in 2019.
Who is predicted to win March Madness 2024? ›
2024 Final Four expert predictions
| Gary Parrish | Chip Patterson |
|---|
| (11) NC State vs. (1) Purdue | Purdue | Purdue |
| (4) Alabama vs. (1) UConn | UConn | UConn |
| National Champion | Purdue | UConn |
Apr 1, 2024
Here's the TL/DR version of the odds of a perfect NCAA bracket: 1 in 9,223,372,036,854,775,808 (if you just guess or flip a coin) 1 in 120.2 billion (if you know a little something about basketball)
What are the prizes for the NCAA bracket challenge? ›
Prizes: GRAND PRIZE FOR MEN'S TOURNAMENT ENTRANT (“Men's Tournament Grand Prize"): A four (4) night trip to the 2025 NCAA Men's Basketball Final Four® Semi-final and Championship games for winner and one (1) guest, to take place in San Antonio, TX in April, 2025.
How many NCAA bracket possibilities are there? ›
There are 263 or 9,223,372,036,854,775,808 unique combinations of winners in a 64-team bracket, meaning that without considering seed number, the odds of picking a perfect bracket are about 9.22 quintillion to 1.
How rare is it to have a perfect bracket? ›
The odds of filling out a perfect bracket are one in 9.2 quintillion. Written out, that's 9,223,372,036,854,775,808. CHARLOTTE, N.C. — March Madness is officially here. The first round of the NCAA Tournament tips off on Thursday when Mississippi State and Michigan State hit the hardwood at Spectrum Center in Charlotte.
How hard is it to get a perfect bracket? ›
Why is it so hard to pick a perfect bracket? The chances of picking a perfect bracket is: 1 in 2 to the 67th power, or 1 in 147,573,952,589,676,412,928, or about 147 quintillion. This assumes that each participant has a 50/50 chance of winning.
Is there a prize for a perfect bracket? ›
For millions of sports fans, filling out NCAA March Madness bracket challenge forms is an annual tradition. One of the biggest March Madness prizes available is at the investment firm Berkshire Hathaway, where Warren Buffett has offered any employee who creates a perfect bracket $1 million a year for life.
