After the Super Bowl, I decided to use the profits from my Chiefs bet on four college basketball futures. I placed $25 each on Arizona (Yikes) , Alabama, Texas and Miami. At 60/1, the Hurricanes is still alive for a chance to cash $1500 on a total investment of $100. With Miami advancing to the Final Four, the age old question has creeped up on me….Do I hedge or let it ride? Sunday was the easy day, now it’s decision time.
Hedge
With a 15 to 1 pay out looming, there is a decent amount of wiggle room to ensure a profit on this year’s national champion in college basketball. The odds are shown below for the four remaining teams. With UConn sitting at -125 it would require a substantial investment to hedge all options on the Final Four before Saturday. It may be too early to cover all possibilities with profit, that kind of feels like one person trying to cover a bed with a fitted sheet… there’s always going to be one corner that comes off. For starters, I’d bet UConn immediately as that number is only going to lay more juice before Saturday. Then, I would watch the first game play out between San Diego State and FAU. Place a bet on them to win Monday and watch the second game play out between UConn and Miami.
- UConn -125
- San Diego State +360
- Miami +475
- Florida Atlantic +600
No Hedge
Rather than throwing out more money for less profit. Let’s just see what happens! $1500 would be a nice win but on a $25 bet and $100 total investment, it’s relatively low risk. I can still bet the games individually and enjoy the ride. Here’s the early lines for Saturday’s semi-final matchups:
- FAU vs San Diego State (-2) / Total 131
- Miami vs UConn (-5.5) / Total 149.5
Final Thoughts
I’m a gambling man. Hedging in the semi-final just doesn’t seem right. We can start this conversation all over again if the Hurricanes advance to the natty on Monday, but for now give me San Diego State ML and Miami +5.5 for Saturday and let the chips fall where they may.
Parlay engineer with Twitter fingers.