Scoring Your March Madness Bracket

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How do you score the rounds for the March Madness Office Pool?

We wanted to touch on how to keep score of your College Basketball Bracket and also go over what we feel are the best bracket scoring structures. First off, there is no universal way to score the bracket. There are many different point structures that can be used, but the overall set up for each is basically the same.

Points Per Round

There are 6 rounds to the NCAA tournament, for each correct winner picked, a player is awarded points based on what round the winner is picked in. In most cases, and the way I feel it should be, the points per round increase as the tournament progresses. I have seen pools ran that award 1 point for every game picked correctly no matter which round it is. The chart below shows possible scoring by round systems, if you read further down the page we explain which system we think works best. Check out our Fillable Bracket and our Excel Bracket, which allow you to completely customize your bracket before printing. This includes filling in the points per round, giving your bracket a title, and typing in any notes/rules you want to pass on to the participants.

Sample Scoring Systems
RND 1	RND 2	RND 3	RND 4	RND 5	RND 6
1	2	3	4	6	10
1	2	4	8	16	32
2	4	6	8	10	12
1	2	3	4	5	6
1	3	6	10	15	20
1	2	4	8	12	16
2	4	8	16	32	64

NCAA Point Systems used by ESPN, Yahoo, FoxSports, NCAA.com and CBS:

These are the top online Tournament Challenge sites.

Pay To Play Ncaa Brackets 2019

RND 1	RND 2	RND 3	RND 4	RND 5	RND 6
ESPN	10	20	40	80	160	320
Yahoo	1	2	4	8	16	32
CBS	1	2	4	8	16	32
FoxSports	1	2	4	8	16	32
NCAA.com	1	2	4	8	16	32

As you can see, CBS, FoxSports, NCAA.com and Yahoo all use the same scoring system and even though ESPN has higher point values they are exactly proportioned to the others (each round is 10x the amount of points). Remember the point value shown is for each game, multiply the number of games per round by the points per game/round then add all of the rounds together to come up with the Total Points Possible.

Round 1 - 32 Games

Round 2 - 16 Games

Round 3 - 8 Games

Round 4 - 4 Games

Round 5 - 2 Games

Round 6 - 1 Game

Total Points Possible for Yahoo, CBS, FoxSports and NCAA.com - 192

Total Points Possible for ESPN Tournament Challenge - 1,920

What system do we use?

Some people prefer to place a great deal of weight on picking the championship game correctly, like in the example 1,2,4,8,16,32. Which basically means the winner of the office pool must correctly pick the winner of the championship game. Others think that picking the most games correctly should weigh more on the outcome, like in the example 1,2,3,4,5,6. I definitely don't like the idea of putting all of the weight on the championship game, you are basically eliminating everyone that does not correctly guess the winner of the tournament. I do however feel that picking the winner in a field of 64(68) does have importance, so I prefer to use the first scoring method in the list above 1,2,3,4,6,10. This gives the people that correctly pick the tournament champion an advantage, but does not completely eliminate the people that didn't correctly guess the champion.

What about the play-in games?

Yes, the NCAA has really threw us for a loop with these new play in games. It wouldn't be so bad if all four of the play-in games were going to make up the 16 seed in each different region. But, the NCAA committee has decided they need to have a couple of 11 and 13 seeds participate in these play-in games instead of two of the 16 seeds. Anyway, you're still wondering how to incorporate these games into your office pool. We wrote a short article titled Do you Count the First Four Games in your College Basketball Pool. This article gives more detail on what you should do with the play-in games, but you basically have 2 options:

Option 1: Just don't count the play-in games, pick your winners based on a field of 64.
Option 2: Score the play-in games as you would any game in the first round, or you can also change your entire point system around to be 7 rounds, which could look something like 1,2,3,4,6,8,12. If you use this option, you will have to have your entries received by Tuesday morning before the first play-in game begins.

Other Scoring Methods

You can always add your own twist to the office pool. Some people award bonus points for upsets picked in the first round. If a player correctly picks a lower seed to beat a higher seed, they are awarded double the points for that game.

You could also try a 'multiplier pool', where each game you pick correctly, the 'seed' number is multiplied by the points in that round.

Example using the 1,2,3,4,6,10 system:
A #1 seed pick in the first round is worth 1 point, a #15 seed would be worth 15 points.

A #1 seed in the 6th round is worth 10 points, a #2 seed would be worth 20 points.

Our new Fillable Bracket allows you to type in the points by round and then print the bracket, no more handwriting on the bracket!

Pay To Play Ncaa Brackets 2020

If you need help filling out your brackets check out our Strategy for Winning your March Madness Pool to ensure your best chances of winning your office pool.

Scoring on the Bracket

Some folks may get confused with how to actually score the bracket. Let's use the first round as an example. Each person has picked 32 teams to win their first round game by writing each team's name in the second round of the bracket. Simply circle each team that was picked correctly and draw an 'x' or a line through the incorrect games. To score the first round, you will actually be circling the names on the second round of the bracket. You do not circle the teams that are pre-entered in the round of 64. Each circle would be worth the corresponding points per round.

2021 March Madness Brackets - Printable NCAA March Madness Brackets for the Tournament

If you're looking for a printable 2021 March Madness bracket, then you came to the right place. Doc's Sports has been in the sports information business since 1971 (50 years ago), and each season we provide our readers with a printable march madness bracket for the NCAA Tournament and will continue to archive this information. Our 2021 Free March Madness Brackets will be updated periodically, so be sure to book mark this page and stop back to print out the updated copy.
Below on this page is an article by Doc's handicapper Robert Ferringo with advice on filling out your NCAA Tournament brackets as well as a great offer for free college basketball picks for the March Madness Tournament. Enjoy the games!

2021 - Click Here to print or download

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Best of luck and we hope you enjoy the 'Madness'

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March Madness Brackets Advice
by Robert Ferringo

You need to respect the March Madness bracket.

Filling out March Madness brackets is one of the most thrilling and enjoyable things that college basketball bettors and fans do all year. There is nothing else in sports like it – the frenzy, the possibility, the tangled web of expectation and anticipated heartache – and it is an experience to be cherished every spring.

But before you can make money off your March Madness picks you have to know and understand how to read the NCAA Tournament bracket. You need to be able to navigate the landmines along that road map to riches without losing a limb. And you need to understand that a March Madness bracket can either be a useful tool for making profitable March Madness predictions or a dangerous weapon of self-immolation that can cripple a bankroll.

There are a hundred tips on how to utilize a March Madness bracket. Here are three to support your quest for winning March Madness predictions:

1. Don’t fill out a bracket.

I know that it is sacrilegious and un-American to suggest not filling out a March Madness bracket. But bear with me. I am not trying to win $50 in an office pool. I’m trying to make $5,000 over the course of the tournament with my college basketball betting. And I say the first step is to not fill out a bracket. At least not completely.

I fill out my March Madness bracket a weekend at a time. When the pairings are announced on Selection Sunday, I instantly go through several brackets and several permutations of how I see the chaos of the opening weekend playing out. Then I sleep on it and over the next day or two I decide on my game plan for handling the first two rounds, and the first two rounds only.

The reason for this is simple: you don’t want to become a slave to your bracket. If you have a No. 4 seed going to the Final Four, you are going to be more inclined to bet on that team, even if they don’t warrant a wager, simply to support your bracket. You can laugh all you want. But this phenomenon is actually a psychological heuristic that has tricked and trapped many a bettor.

Flexibility and the ability to adapt quickly are imperative this time of year. Don’t pin yourself down to something early in the tournament. But, instead, wait and see how things play out and then adjust your wagers to that.

2. Dig up the seeds.

Understanding the NCAA Tournament seeding is an important aspect of handicapping The Big Dance. Some teams feel they are underseeded. And they respond to this perceived slight or show of disrespect with a little extra edge and motivation and that can propel them to perform beyond expectations. Other teams may be overseeded. And not only do you need to be able to pick these teams out so you can target them as overvalued by the betting public and the sportsbooks, but it is also important to target teams that might be resting on their laurels a little bit after being shown too much respect.

Further, there are certain seeds – like the No. 12 vs. No. 5 matchups – that are more prone to being upset than others. Knowing the history of how each seed is expected to perform at each level of the bracket can be an advantage for college basketball bettors.

3. Look for scheduling quirks in the bracket.

Even though some people accuse the NCAA Tournament selection committe of picking names out of a hat, there is actually a lot of thought that goes into constructing the NCAA Tournament bracket. And there are certain very subtle things that you can look for that may give you an edge when it comes to handicapping a particular matchup.

You want to find teams that are scheduled to play close to home. NCAA Tournament games are played on neutral courts. But some are more neutral than others. Teams with rabid fan bases, like Kentucky or Kansas, will have fans anywhere. Others, particularly smaller schools, will benefit by being scheduled to play close to their fan bases or on familiar turf.

Also, you want to take length and breadth of travel into account. Some teams are coming off grueling conference tournaments and then have to fly across country to play in an early afternoon game. Other teams have to travel from West to the East Coast, and the time difference can throw them off. There is any number of situational advantages or disadvantages that certain schools have to endure and it is key to target them.

Have fun and enjoy your March Madness brackets. This is one of the most exciting times of the year for gamblers, and it is one of the biggest sports betting events on the calendar. But be smart and attentive, and use your bracket to your advantage. You’ll find that the tournament is much more enjoyable when you end the month with a lot more money than you started with.

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