According to our friends at the American Gaming Association, legal betting at regulated sportsbooks this years March Madness betting is expected to exceed $2.7 billion, which would make the total nearly twice as much as what was bet on the Super Bowl this year. Of course, the Super Bowl was just one game, while this is both the men’s and women’s tournaments, with over 120 teams, so that stands to reason.
The AGA’s analysis pulled together monthly sports betting revenue reports from various states, focusing on bets placed for NCAA basketball tournament games with American sportsbooks. Up to this year, the AGA conducted online surveys to estimate these numbers, which included bracket pools. Last year’s survey suggested a $15.5 billion estimate for March Madness betting, with bracket pools and bets from unlicensed bookmakers. As for the tracking change, the AGA stated that with legal sports betting now for five years old, and available in 38 states, they wanted to focus to the legal market.
Casino proprietor Derek Stevens, who owns The D and Circa Las Vegas, remarked that the betting action during the first week of the men’s NCAA tournament exceeded that of the Super Bowl. He noted that his sportsbook were fully booked for the tournament’s opening days. He added that March Madness betting is …definitively the biggest week of the year, and Super Bowl is definitively the second biggest.
A recent report from research firm Eilers and Krejcik Gaming projected that 35-40% of the men’s NCAA tournament betting volume would stem from in-game wagers, with 5% coming from same-game parlays. Additionally, Eilers and Krejcik estimated that recent bans on prop bets involving NCAA players in Ohio and Maryland could decrease sportsbook revenues in those states by 5-10%.