With 16 NBA games, 23 NHL games, 28 college basketball games and The Players Championship, there are thousands of online sports betting opportunities at BetMGM this weekend.
College Basketball
Selection Sunday
Sunday, March 12 | TV: CBS | 6 p.m. ET
After the final five auto-bid tickets are punched Sunday afternoon, we’ll find out who’s out and who’s in the 2023 NCAA Tournament. And that’ll unleash a March Madness betting beast that includes 67 games over 21 days (and BetMGM’s Bracket Challenge).
Here are a few betting trends:
The over went 31-36 in 2022, the fourth straight tournament that it wasn’t profitable and the third time in four tournaments it finished at least five games below .500.
No. 1 seeds covered the spread in only four of 14 opportunities last year, the worst cover rate (.286) since 2006 (.267). Kansas had three of those four ATS wins.
The Mountain West flopped last year: Boise State, Colorado State, San Diego State and Wyoming combined for zero wins to extend the conference’s tourney losing streak to nine games. The conference’s last tournament win (and last tournament ATS win) was Nevada’s 22-point comeback against Cincinnati in 2018.
PGA Tour
The Players Championship
Saturday & Sunday, March 11-12 | NBC | 1 p.m. ET
There’s never been a repeat champion at The Players Championship. And with Cameron Smith preparing for LIV Golf Tucson next weekend instead of preparing to defend his title at TPC Sawgrass, there won’t be a repeat champion again in 2023.
Each of the last three winners came from inside the top 10 of pre-tournament odds, most recently Smith last year at +3300.
As of Wednesday, Rory McIlory is atop the PGA Tour betting board, though he’s struggled for consistency in recent years. His 2019 win at TPC Sawgrass has been sandwiched by missed cuts and finishes outside the top 30.
Despite sitting above Jon Rahm in tournament winner odds, McIlroy is tied with Rahm in several other betting markets, including Top-5 Finish (+200), Top-10 Finish (-110), Top-20 Finish (-200), and Top European (+333).
Rahm has never finished better than ninth in five appearances, most recently finishing 55th last year.
NHL
New York Rangers at Pittsburgh Penguins
Sunday, March 12 | TNT | 4 p.m. ET
Before news broke Feb. 25 of the New York Rangers’ likely acquisition of Patrick Kane, the Rangers were +1400 in Stanley Cup odds, tied for the sixth-shortest.
Three days later, when the trade became official, the Rangers were +1100, tied for the fourth-shortest. And the public was pounding them at the sportsbook. In less than a week, the Rangers’ Stanley Cup ticket share jumped from 6.8% to 9.2% and handle share from 11.4% to 15.4%.
The Penguins, meanwhile, continue falling in Stanley Cup odds — from +2200 to +3500 — despite a hot streak that has them in position to land the second wild-card spot and thus avoid the Boston Bruins in the first round.
They haven’t covered a regular-season puck line against the Rangers since April 2021 and are 6-16 ATS in the regular-season series over the last six seasons.
