March Madness is here, which means it’s time for me to dust off the ol’ player projection model, forecast the playing time for hundreds of players I’ve never heard of and place a psychologically unhealthy number of prop bets for the next three weeks.
I’ll be honest: I don’t follow college basketball. I like the sport in theory, but in actuality I don’t take the time to watch it. That has been the case for years.
Even so, in 2019 I pulled together a “model” (set of spreadsheets) to project player production for the NCAA men’s basketball tournament, and since then I’ve used this model (and updated versions of it) to bet profitably in the player prop market.
- 2019: 125-69-12, +39.8 units
- 2021: 106-64-1, +33.8 units
- 2022: 243-210, +14.9 units
- 2023: 159-114, +40.39 units (Through Thursday Round 1)
2023 NCAA Tournament Player Prop Bet Projections: USC vs. Michigan State
| Player | PTs | REBs | ASTs | PTs + REBs | PTs + ASTs | PRAs | 3Ps | FTs |
| Boogie Ellis | 17.9 | 4.0 | 3.0 | 21.9 | 20.9 | 24.9 | 2.5 | 3.6 |
| Drew Peterson | 13.5 | 6.7 | 4.2 | 20.2 | 17.7 | 24.4 | 1.4 | 2.3 |
| Tre White | 8.3 | 5.2 | 1.0 | 13.5 | 9.3 | 14.5 | 0.4 | 1.2 |
| Kobe Johnson | 9.7 | 5.9 | 2.7 | 15.6 | 12.4 | 18.4 | 0.9 | 2.2 |
| Reese Dixon-Waters | 9.6 | 3.5 | 1.1 | 13.1 | 10.7 | 14.2 | 0.8 | 1.9 |
| Joshua Morgan | 6.5 | 5.6 | 0.5 | 12.0 | 6.9 | 12.5 | 0.0 | 1.3 |
| Vincent Iwuchukwu | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Malik Thomas | 1.1 | 0.5 | 0.1 | 1.6 | 1.2 | 1.8 | 0.1 | 0.2 |
| Kijani Wright | 1.1 | 1.1 | 0.2 | 2.2 | 1.3 | 2.4 | 0.0 | 0.2 |
| Harrison Hornery | 0.2 | 0.1 | 0.0 | 0.3 | 0.2 | 0.3 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Oziyah Sellers | 0.2 | 0.1 | 0.0 | 0.3 | 0.2 | 0.3 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Iaroslav Niagu | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Zach Brooker | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Player | PTs | REBs | ASTs | PTs + REBs | PTs + ASTs | PRAs | 3Ps | FTs |
| Tyson Walker | 15.3 | 3.1 | 3.1 | 18.5 | 18.4 | 21.6 | 1.9 | 1.4 |
| Joey Hauser | 14.1 | 8.2 | 2.0 | 22.3 | 16.1 | 24.3 | 2.3 | 2.2 |
| A.J. Hoggard | 12.2 | 4.4 | 6.2 | 16.6 | 18.4 | 22.8 | 0.7 | 3.5 |
| Jaden Akins | 10.0 | 4.8 | 1.3 | 14.8 | 11.3 | 16.1 | 1.8 | 0.8 |
| Malik Hall | 8.7 | 4.7 | 1.2 | 13.4 | 9.9 | 14.6 | 0.8 | 1.8 |
| Mady Sissoko | 4.9 | 7.1 | 0.6 | 12.0 | 5.5 | 12.6 | 0.0 | 1.4 |
| Pierre Brooks | 0.7 | 0.4 | 0.1 | 1.1 | 0.8 | 1.2 | 0.2 | 0.0 |
| Jaxon Kohler | 2.4 | 2.7 | 0.3 | 5.1 | 2.6 | 5.4 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Tre Holloman | 1.3 | 1.0 | 0.9 | 2.3 | 2.2 | 3.2 | 0.1 | 0.2 |
| Carson Cooper | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Jason Whitens | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Davis Smith | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Steven Izzo | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Nick Sanders | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |