The NCAA shot clock is winding down.
The action has moved to Houston and there, at NRG Stadium, the courts wait for Saturday (when the field narrows to two) and Monday (when a new champion will cut down the net.)
Could there possibly be any numbers left to crunch? To dazzle your buddies at the sports bar? Turns out, there are.
TV rights are so expensive that Turner and CBS teamed up to pay the $750 million it cost.
There are 63 games in the tournament so that comes down to (give or take) about $10 million in rights per game.
$9 billion is bet on the tournament (even though the NCAA won’t have anything to do with sites that take money for bets on its schools, and has actually disallowed the networks from accepting ads and sponsorship for fantasy sites during the tournament)
Nobody thought Syracuse would get this far; in fact, the odds against it were 400/1.
Anyone placing a $100 bet on Syracuse to win it all would go home from the casino $40,000 richer (if, of course, Syracuse were to win.)
And of course, the biggest winners of all will be the destinations hosting March Madness play, who reap the benefits.
That’s a lot of numbers. Want to hear them crunched again? Watch this video.
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