Mixed Bag For March Madness Bettors

There were mixed results for sports bettors at the start of the 2009 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament, but the gambling public in general was dealt a serious blow by one of the day's most bet on teams - The Memphis Tigers.

Number two-seeded Memphis may have just narrowly escaped a loss against number 15-seeded Cal Northridge in the final minutes in a game that was competitive throughout.  Memphis managed to win by 11 points but the spread was 18 ½.  Nearly 90 percent of the betting public was on Memphis in this one. 

The other two early afternoon games were split between the gambling public and bookmakers.

LSU pulled off a four point win with a -3 spread while Texas A&M beat BYU as the +4 ½ underdog. 

Gambling911.com expert handicappers had predicted an LSU win as did the betting public which were on the Tigers at a 64 percent clip.  Still, much of the money line action was coming in on Butler to win outright (75 percent).

57 percent of the betting public was on the BYU spread while 72 percent of the money line action was on Texas A&M to win outright. 

These were the Top 10 March Madness bets at Sportsbook.com:

#1 Memphis U - Point Spread

#2 Lsu - Point Spread

#3 Maryland - Point Spread

#4 California - Point Spread

#5 Butler - Point Spread

#6 Byu - Point Spread

#7 Washington U - Point Spread

#8 Texas A&m - Point Spread

#9 Purdue - Point Spread

#10 Texas - Point Spread

Carrie Stroup, Gambling911.com Senior Reporter