No more March Madness Cinderellas? NIL, transfer portal boosting favorites over underdogs

New York Times

04-04-2025

What do you do when you write an annual series about NCAA tournament upsets during a year when there aren't any? You take stock and start thinking about the future.
And right now, we're wondering whether March has forever lost much of its madness, courtesy of NIL payments and the transfer portal.
The 2025 tourney started with chalk and never relented. After one round, only three teams seeded 11th or higher remained: No. 11 Drake, No. 12 Colorado State and No. 12 McNeese. They all disappeared after the second round, leaving No. 10 Arkansas as the only double-digit seed in the Sweet 16. The Elite Eight tied a record set in 2007 for the lowest seed total (13): four No.1 seeds, three No. 2 seeds, and one No. 3 seed. And for only the second time in the history of the modern tournament (2008), four No. 1 seeds advanced to the Final Four.
It's not just that the top seeds vanquished their underdog challengers. They did so decisively. Top-four seeds went 11-5 against the spread in the first round, posting huge average margins of victory:
This all leads to the crucial and obvious question we posed at the top: Will NIL and the transfer portal mean the end of upset-heavy tournaments?
First, some perspective and a word of caution — think back nearly two decades to those favorite-laden years of 2007 and 2008. Those tournaments came directly on the heels of another significant change, the one-and-done rule. Starting with the 2006 draft, high school players could no longer directly enter the NBA. The 2006-07 season was the first in years where the top high school prospects actually went to college.
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We quickly ended up with two chalky tournaments, and elite freshmen played a pivotal role. Greg Oden and Mike Conley led Ohio State to the 2007 national championship game. The 2008 Final Four featured Kevin Love and Derrick Rose. While veterans played heavy roles in those tournaments, the flood of favorites in the Final Four made it seem like the return of elite freshmen in college hoops had widened the gap between top-tier programs and everyone else.
In hindsight, we know that was nothing more than small-sample-size theater and that the thrill of upsets quickly returned to March Madness. But 2025 feels different. The one-and-done rule doesn't compare to the massive sea change college sports have undergone since 2020. Schools now openly pay for elite talent, and without the requirement to sit out a year when transferring, every player becomes a free agent each spring.
It's certainly true that one season is not evidence of a trend. Last year, seven teams recorded first-round upsets that met the Bracket Breaker criteria (at least a five-seed difference). But we are still in the early stages of this new ecosystem, and it stands to reason that power schools will become more efficient in using NIL and scouting and recruiting players from lower-level programs. Doing so will make it much harder for mid-major programs to retain their best players.
More than 1,000 players are already in the portal, including many of the best players from mid-major tourney teams. Drake's Bennett Stirtz is following coach Ben McCollum to Iowa (just as the duo went from Northwest Missouri State to Drake a year ago). New Mexico's Donovan Dent has committed to UCLA. Lipscomb is set to lose Jacob Ognacevic (20 ppg, 8 rpg). Troy's leading scorer, Tayton Conerway? In the portal. Pick a lower-level school that earned an automatic bid to the tourney, and you'll likely find a player parlaying that success into a better offer from a bigger program.
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Look back another year, and you'll see a similar trend that perhaps helped set the stage for this year's chalk-fest. Trey Townsend, who led Oakland to the big upset of Kentucky, transferred to Arizona (where he was the starting power forward this season). Danny Wolf, who led Yale to its upset win over Auburn, transferred to Michigan (where he coincidentally faced Auburn in the tourney again this year). Also, Terrence Edwards Jr. went from James Madison (which missed the tournament despite tying for the top spot in the Sun Belt) to Louisville.
If our statistical model, Slingshot, had lungs, it would sigh. It's hard to imagine how mid-majors can compete in this world. It's not something we can study yet since the sample size remains too small. But in the future, we wonder whether factors such as minutes continuity and experience will emerge as significant statistical indicators of upsets, the way offensive rebounding and turnover percentage have done for years. Maybe we'll even reach a point where NIL budgets are publicly available for all schools, which would be critical to upsets (and our projection of them).
Or maybe the randomness of a one-and-done tournament will remain the standard in March, and 2025 will ultimately be known as a one-year blip. It's too soon to tell. But from where we sit, it sure looks like the work of breaking brackets has become a whole lot harder.