The NCAA tournament is just around the corner, so before we focus on betting on that, it’s time to take a look at some tips and strategy for having a profitable run betting on the conference tournaments first.  Conference tournament play in college basketball betting can be one of the more profitable times of the year, especially if you can find a few of the right teams to ride all the way to their conference championship games.  A lot of these teams may be outside of the major conferences though, which means that it could take a bit of research to find the diamonds in the rough.  We are going to take a look at what types of teams specifically to look for, and also the teams to avoid as well, because there is definitely a huge difference in teams’ styles when tournament time rolls around.
Don’t Expect Much From These Teams
It’d be a great story if we could see the 10 or 11 seed in the ACC make one of the most incredible runs in history to make it into the big dance, but honestly this year, it’s just not going to happen.  You’ll find that teams who don’t have realistic NCAA tournament expectations going into the conference tournaments won’t make much noise, so betting on them to do so probably is not your best idea, and it’s probably better to focus on the teams who are out to prove something, or are simply just hot heading into the tournaments.
Bubble Teams
Obviously you are going to get a little of both sides in this spot, which means that sometimes the teams will show up big, and other times they will flop.  One thing that you can feel pretty confident in though, is that if they are in a tournament where they have to play a round or two before hitting one of the top three or four seeds in the conference tournament, that they will typically get the job done against those average teams that they play in the first round or two.  It may not be an instant cover every time, but betting on them to pull out must win games early in tournaments against average competition is a pretty solid bet all around.
Hot Teams
If a team hits their conference tournament on a five or six game win streak against conference opponents, then it’s probably a safe bet to say that they are in some sort of a “tournament zone”.  This is the story of the Connecticut Huskies going into the NCAA TOURNAMENT (not conference tournament), as they were hot to win the Big East, and then just kept on rolling.  If you a find a spot where a middle of the road team, or even a strong top tier team is riding a wave of wins going into their tournament, see if you can find a good match-up spot to get a bet in on them in their opening round match-up!
