NCAAB March Madness West Region Round 1 Best Bets & Odds

The Madness is here. The Madness of the March variety, to be specific. And we’ve already had several great games both in the conference championship tournaments and the First Four, so we’ll be looking to see that continue into the tournament proper.

This is the second in a series of betting guides we’ve put together for each of the four regions in the tournament. Here, we take a look at the West Region, where the 32-2 Arizona Wildcats lead the way as the No. 1 seed. Which favorites will come through? Which underdogs will cause a ruckus? Read on for our best bets for those wanting to put money down on a favorite, an underdog, and an over. And of course we’ve got you covered with March Madness betting odds for all eight games.

NCAA Basketball March Madness West Region First Round Betting Odds & Best Bets - March 19-20

All odds provided by Betway.

Best Bet on a Favourite: No. 3 Gonzaga (-21.5) over No. 14 Kennesaw State

If there’s any favorite you can count on in the first round, it’s Gonzaga. Under head coach Mark Few, who has been leading this program since 1999, they have only lost thrice in the First Round of March Madness. The most recent of those? 2008. 16 straight wins in the opening round gives us confidence. But how have they won those games?

Well, last year they won their First Round matchup by 21. The year before that they also won by 21. The year before that they flipped it, winning by 12. But the year before that they were back to their usual ways, winning by, you guessed it, 21. In 2021, they missed an excellent double 21 opportunity, instead winning by 43 points. Of course, the spread for Gonzaga this year is 21. We still like them to cover, though -20.5 at -135 odds isn’t a terrible safety net either.

Best Bet on an Underdog: No. 12 High Point (+330) upsets No. 5 Wisconsin

High Point comes into this First Round matchup on an absolute roll. They’ve won their last 14 games in a row and they play the type of high octane basketball that can lead to a lot of variance in results. Which is exactly what you want when you’re looking for an upset. They looked great last year in a tough loss to Purdue in their March Madness debut, so they’ll be playing with even more confidence this time around.

They score at an insane clip, putting up 90.0 points per game this season, good for third-most in the nation. But the thing about all that scoring is that it’s not high variance. It’s reliable: High Point is top 10 in both offensive and defensive turnover percentage, which means they get a ton of easy transition looks. The Wisconsin Badgers are top five in turnover rate themselves, but we think the momentum is with the Panthers here.

Best Bet to Hit the Over: No. 4 Arkansas vs. No. 13 Hawaii (Over 159.0)

When you’re looking for a good over bet in NCAA hoops, you can look at how much teams usually score to give you an idea of where to go. But an even better indicator is the pace at which teams play, which is more consistent.

Both No. 4 Arkansas and No. 13 Hawaii are top 25 in the country when it comes to pace, with the former averaging 75.0 possessions per game (16th) and the latter going for 74.5 possessions a night (23rd). A team—whether Arkansas or their opponent—hasn’t fallen short of 75 points in a Razorbacks game since February 10, and we expect that trend to hold to open up the tourney.