March Madness First Round Cinderella Betting Teams

Posted by Joe Solari on Wednesday,March 16, 2016 4:26, EDT in

Betting on favorites is usually the in-thing in March Madness odds at this time of the year, mainly because of how the March Madness market is often flooded by recreational bettors that love to go for the easy and obvious college basketball picks. But for the majority of the seasoned bettors that are well-aware of the upset-filled nature of the NCAA Tournament, spotting Cinderella teams and upset picks is what makes the Tourney most memorable and worthwhile for them, as it offers them a chance for big underdog profits and mega bragging rights in their brackets. You wanna be part of this latter group? If you are, here are a couple of Cinderellas we strongly believe will make it worth your while by going past their opponents in the first round.

March Madness First Round Cinderella Betting Teams

No.6 Seton Hall over No. 11 Gonzaga

The Gonzaga Bulldogs didn’t have a dominant regular season and were on the verge of missing an NCAA Tournament bid for the first time in 18 years, but they got the job done by beating Portland, BYU and Saint Mary’s to win the WCC Tournament, a résumé that earned them a slot in the Tourney. Having two future NBA stars in forward Kyle Wiltjer (20.7 points and 6.5 rebounds per game this season) and forward/center Domantas Sabonis (17.4 points on 61.7 percent shooting and 11.6 rebounds per game) has been a key reason behind Gonzaga’s resurgence, and they will certainly be a handful to Seton Hall if they can bring their A-game. Unfortunately for the Zags, the two stars have been quite inconsistent in big games, and their supporting cast is no good. Making matters worse, they’ll be facing an in-form Seton Hall team that finished third in the regular season in the highly competitive Big East, before sweeping past Creighton, Associated Press No. 5 Xavier, and AP No. 3 Villanova in the championship game to claim the Big East Tournament title. In addition, SHU has a scary star in Big East Tournament MVP Isaiah Whitehead (averaging 18.4 points, 5.0 assists and 3.6 rebounds per game this season) who will be tough to handle. More importantly, the Pirates are from a stronger conference yet they have lost just two of their last 14 games, so the higher-seeded SHU should be able to take down the overrated Bulldogs. Cinderella NCAAB Pick: Seton Hall

No. 14 Fresno State Over No. 3 Utah

To their credit, the Utes have a true NBA-caliber center in Jakob Poeltl and just before suffering that loss to Oregon in the Pac-12 Tournament, this Utah team was riding hot on an incredible nine-game winning streak. That said, the Utes have been terribly inconsistent and the manner in which they got outclassed by Oregon is really worrying. This brings me to the surging Fresno State Bulldogs who impressively toppled San Diego State in the Mountain West Championship. Meanwhile, Marvelle Harris, the Mountain West Player of the Year, has been a monster all season and the Bulldogs did hold their own quite well against the same Oregon team earlier in the season, losing 78-73. That’s a lot of pedigree for the Bulldogs, especially if you compare it to Utah’s 88-57 wipeout at the hands of Oregon last week. So although Utah has more weapons in its armory and the Utes can rise to the occasion here, I believe that Fresno State will be able to pull an upset if it can find a way of containing the towering Poeltl. Cinderella NCAAB Pick: Fresno State.

Other Cinderella NCAAB Picks: No. 11 Wichita State over No. 6 Arizona, No. 14 Stephen F. Austin over No. 3 West Virginia.