Average Final Score of March Madness National Championship Game

Millions of basketball fans will soon be hunting for any scrap of information that can give them an edge in their bracket pools.

Inevitably, that leads to a great deal of questions about the average score of college basketball games.

Average Final Score of March Madness

Since the year 2000, the average final score of a March Madness championship game is 141 points.

This is key information since most bracket pools use final total score as a tiebreaker.

141 points may be the average total offensive output, but there is a high degree of volatility in college basketball games. Styles make fights, after all. 

For instance, several championship games over the last several years have landed on exactly 159. It’s common for championship games to shoot into the high 150s or even the low 160s.

On the other hand, defensive showdowns are almost as common, and there can be some pretty extreme outliers in this direction. 

The 2011 championship between Butler and UConn is a prime example of how ugly these games can occasionally get. Kemba Walker and UConn won, 53-41.

Last year, UConn and San Diego State played fairly close to the average, with 135 total points in the Huskies’ victory.

Average Points In College Basketball Game

When you widen out the data to look at all men’s basketball games – rather than just NCAA Tournament finales – there is generally more offense. 

During most seasons, the average college basketball team will score between 72 and 75 points per game on average. That means the average game features between 145 and 150 points, or a little bit more than the average points scored in a March Madness final championship game.