2025 Bracket Picks Year in Review
The 2025 NCAA Tournament delivered our first “All Four No. 1 Seeds in the Final Four” since 2008—just two years after none even made the Elite Eight.
Florida emerged as the national champion out of the West Region, staging multiple second-half comebacks in San Antonio, including a title game win over Houston. That matchup came on the heels of one of the wildest finishes in tournament history, when Houston erased a six-point deficit in the final 40 seconds to stun Duke in the Final Four.
While the Final Four brought fireworks, the rest of the tournament was historically chalky:
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The Elite Eight included four No. 1 seeds, three No. 2 seeds, and a No. 3 seed.
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No. 10 Arkansas was the only team seeded worse than No. 6 to reach the Sweet 16.
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Only two double-digit seeds reached the Second Round—and only one true upset (McNeese State over Clemson) happened in the First Round.
Our public edge on picking the eventual champion ended this year. Our Best Brackets were heaviest on Duke, and that pick nearly paid off. Still, our read that the top seeds were unusually dominant proved accurate—we picked all four No. 1s to go deep and included each as a champion on at least some bracket sets across pool sizes.
We’ll review subscriber survey responses to get a clearer picture of performance, especially for those who played alternate brackets with Florida as the winner or had prize-clinching lineups heading into the Final Four.
Here’s what went right, what went wrong, and a full review of our 2025 bracket performance.
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Reminder: If you used the NCAA Bracket Picks product this year, please complete our subscriber survey if one is available so we can collect real-world data on how our brackets performed.
PoolGenius 2025 Bracket Performance Summary
Our pre-tournament data had the four No. 1 seeds as a tier of their own. We had Duke as the most likely champion and rated Florida as the second-highest rated team and second-most likely champion. All four were rated above even the best team entering the tournament in some other recent years, like 2023.
Here’s how that dynamic generally impacted our optimized brackets in 2025:
- In pools that use the traditional scoring system (1-2-4-8-16-32), our Best Brackets had Duke as champion in small to medium pools, alternating the runner-up between Florida and Auburn. As pools got larger, Auburn was the champion pick in some, and then Texas Tech (and Duke) at the largest sizes.
- Florida as champion was the 2nd bracket at the two smallest pool sizes, as a direct complement to the Duke brackets, and other alternate brackets also had Auburn and Houston as champions. Those two Florida alternate brackets (174 points and 170 points, with the Final Four exactly right) were likely pool-winning entries for those that played them.
- Brackets for other types of pools with non-standard scoring also had a lot of Duke as champion, though they varied in what the rest of the bracket looked like. Due to the lack of upsets, the seed-based and other extreme scoring formats likely did not perform well, as those will tend to do better when the correct seed-based upsets hit.
- Our brackets also had strong numbers to the Elite Eight, as No. 3 Texas Tech was more commonly featured over No. 2 St. John’s, particularly in the majority of Best Brackets.
Performance Update (with Survey Results)
This section was created on April 24, 2025 to reflect the survey results of our subscribers.
With several weeks of survey results now calculated, here’s how the numbers shaped up for 2025.
Overall, subscribers won a prize in each pool 27% of the time, versus an expectation of 11% based on pool size and payout information. That 2.4x is in line with, but slightly lower than, our average yearly Bracket Picks performance since 2017.
The Duke loss had an impact on that, as they were the most common champion pick. It’s a testament to how the bracket picks did overall, though, that subscribers still reported above-average results compared to the average pool participant.
Not surprisingly, those who submitted two entries performed the best, with 46% winning a prize, compared to an expected 13%. That comes out to a 3.6x edge. Those who submitted only one entry still outperformed the public, but the edge was lower, at 1.8 times and a 13% rate of winning a prize.
Our second bracket, at some smaller pool sizes, had Florida over Houston, which facilitated these numbers.
The performance was strongest in pools of around 31-50 entries, with those of 11-30 and 51-100 entries also showing strong results. Meanwhile, the performance in the largest pools (250+ entries) was lower, just narrowly above the public expectation, as the alternate brackets tended to take more risks and move away from popular Florida.
The bracket performances were also relatively higher in standard scoring rules pools (winning 2.4 times more often) and other pools with round-based scoring only (winning 3.0 times more often). Meanwhile, there was little edge (1.4x) in seed-based scoring formats, where the lack of higher seeds making deep runs sunk those entries more.
What a Winning Bracket Looked Like in 2025
Based on how this year’s NCAA Tournament played out, our subscribers likely saw extremely high scoring totals in their pools, with all four No. 1 seeds to the Final Four.
Based on public picking trends, the typical bracket had between two and three (2.3) Final Four teams correct in 2025. Our average across all bracket types was over three correct (3.1), and for the Best Brackets in standard scoring, that number was at 3.7, with most of the misses coming at larger pool sizes.
To get an idea of what kind of brackets won pools this year, we looked at the top 10 scoring entries in a pool with almost 300 entries, with standard 1-2-4-8-16-32 scoring. Here’s what we observed:
- All the top 10 brackets had No. 1 Florida winning the national title.
- Eight of the top 10 had all four Final Four teams.
- Only three of the Top 10 had Houston as the runner-up. One of those was the 1st place entry, the only one to pick the entire Final Four correctly. The other two finished in the Top 10 by getting the finals game correct, even though they were the two that missed a Final Four team. One had Louisville in the Final Four, while the other had Michigan State.
- The first-place finisher was also the only one to correctly complete all the Elite Eight and beyond at this pool size.
Because Houston was a relatively less popular champion and runner-up pick from the right side of the bracket, you could place highly in a pool of this size even if you did not have the exact title game correct, as long as you had the champion right and got most of the other late-round points. At smaller pool sizes, some winners might not have even needed Florida over Houston (instead of Florida over Duke) to finish first.
PoolGenius 2025 Bracket Performance Detail
Here is how our bracket picks compared to the public for the 2025 tournament in each round:
| Bracket Type | Correct R1 Picks | Correct R2 Picks | Correct Sweet 16 Picks | Correct Elite 8 Picks | Correct Finalist Picks | Correct Champ Picks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PG Best Brackets For 1-2-4-8-16-32 Scoring | 25.6 | 11.8 | 7.31 | 3.68 | 0.48 | 0.00 |
| PG Best Brackets For All Scoring Rules | 24.9 | 11.2 | 7.02 | 3.60 | 0.53 | 0.01 |
| All PG Brackets For 1-2-4-8-16-32 Scoring | 25.9 | 11.8 | 6.93 | 3.22 | 0.74 | 0.13 |
| All PG Brackets | 25.2 | 11.2 | 6.61 | 3.14 | 0.77 | 0.15 |
| The General Public | 24.2 | 10.1 | 5.34 | 2.27 | 0.65 | 0.26 |
Our run of outperforming the public average in each round ended at 13 straight, going back to the 2023 Sweet 16 (when we were 0.02 teams on average below the public). It ended in a very painful and dramatic fashion with Duke’s blown lead against Houston late in a game they had led the entire way.
Up until the Final Four, our picks outpaced the public by a large margin. Our Best Brackets for standard scoring outscored the public average by more than 25 points, or nearly as much as the title game is worth.
That gap closed with the Duke loss and Florida winning the title as a reasonably popular pick.
Let’s look deeper at what went right and wrong in 2025.
What Worked and Didn’t in Our 2025 Brackets
Generally, a successful bracket-picking strategy (especially for larger bracket pools) requires making some calculated bets against the public.
The logic determining which teams we “bet on” in our customized brackets for subscribers is driven in part by each team’s tournament rating, which often includes an adjustment we make to its full-season power rating based on factors like lineup changes and injuries.
In retrospect, we had some hits and misses with our ratings adjustments this year, as will happen every year. However, the most extreme adjustments were directionally accurate in most cases.
(As a quick reminder, we provided subscribers with all our adjusted tournament predictive ratings in our NCAA Bracket Picks product. We also provided a detailed writeup containing our thoughts on the 2025 bracket and associated pick strategy.)
Because our algorithms customize bracket picks based on a pool’s size and scoring system (e.g., upset bonuses will change recommended picks to include more upset picks), our subscribers’ optimized brackets can differ quite a bit from pool to pool. Nevertheless, some common themes likely impacted 2025 results for the majority of our subscribers.
1) Accurate Read on Top Teams and Field Gap
We know, we know, some of you looked at the brackets that were getting in 2025 and thought: “You are telling me to pick all the No. 1 seeds?”
We like to give advice that gives you the best chance to win, and every year is different. While we will provide more conservative guidance, we also do not auto-recommend the No. 1 seeds every year. Identifying which ones are relatively stronger plays and which other teams are contenders is key. For example, two years ago, our larger pool sizes featured a fair amount of No. 4 Connecticut as champion picks that worked out. We did not have that situation this year. This was a year with four really strong top seeds.
We wrote this in the Bracket Writeup:
Finally, we will comment briefly on picking all four No. 1 seeds to the Final Four and having each of the other No. 1 seeds, and no one else, show up as an alternate champion at the smallest pool sizes.
Here is a summary of the teams with the best odds to win from our Monday numbers for the last five years from all teams outside the top seed line. We also list how many non-No. 1 seeds had at least a 4% chance of winning the title in recent seasons.
Year Seed Team Odds to Win Non-1 Seeds, 4%+
2025 2 Alabama 4.1% 1
2024 2 Arizona 7.6% 5
2023 3 Gonzaga 6.0% 7
2022 2 Kentucky 11.6% 4
2021 2 Iowa 6.0% 4
The dropoff in title odds is more severe this year because of how highly the No. 1 seeds rate this season. We do not have as many alternatives that make sense, especially in small pools. Alabama, and everyone else, has less than half of the odds to win than Auburn and Houston, who are themselves less than half the odds to win than Duke.
That’s too much extra risk to take when it is unnecessary. If you pick a team to win the title in a 25-entry pool, and they have less than a 4% chance of winning, you are not gaining any edge (and are actually giving it away).
Because of the dropoff to other teams this year, our alternate brackets and Final Four combos will mostly be No. 1 seeds, with just a few different options mixed in on some alternates to leverage against key picks in the others.
Yes, it took some close calls (Houston over Purdue in the Sweet 16, Florida’s big rally against Texas Tech in the Elite Eight). Still, that overall read was correct, and our subscriber base as a whole benefited from having a high percentage of pools near the top of the leaderboard entering the Final Four.
2) But Duke Fell Short in the Final Four
Our Best Brackets were set up in outstanding shape entering the Final Four and had the betting favorite as the key pick with just three games to go. That is a pretty strong position to be in. Sometimes, though, just as in poker, you get outdrawn.
And that Final Four loss to Houston was the definition of catching some bad cards late. Duke led by double digits most of the game, and still had a six-point lead and the ball as the clock went under a minute. It took a combination of so many things to conspire for one of the craziest comebacks in Final Four history.
If the Final Four were magically replayed tomorrow, Duke would again be the favorite. It did not work out. We’ll see what impact that had on win rates, as some Duke brackets may have been able to still get into some money spots based on accumulating enough points to that result, but that will be pool-dependent. It will also depend on how many had Florida in an alternate bracket.
3) Florida Over Houston Was the Alternate Title Game in Small Pools
Florida was the alternate champion (beating Houston in the title game) in the first alternate bracket at the smallest pool sizes in standard scoring pools. These were pools with “effective” pool sizes of 35 or fewer entries. We say “effective” here because it depended on the overall pool size and the payout structure. For example, a pool with 100 entries and 10 payout spots was likely to get one of the Florida over Houston brackets that scored either 174 or 170 points as the top alternate. A 100-entry winner-take-all pool, meanwhile, would not.
We will not know exactly how many of you benefited from those alternate brackets until all of our subscribers respond to the surveys.
The alternate brackets are specifically created to complement the Best Bracket. For example, if Duke fails, what’s the most likely outcome? It would be our second-rated team, Florida, over the next-highest-rated on the same side of the bracket as Duke, which was Houston.
This result is the argument for playing alternate brackets together in pools. The Duke Best Bracket looked like it was well-positioned to win. One of the scenarios that would result if that did not happen was the one that played out. Those alternate brackets were highly likely to be top scorers in their pools if they were played.
4) Our Biggest Pre-Tournament Adjustments: Colorado State, Florida, Drake
We take time to dig into teams and make calls on which teams are better or worse than their overall power rating for the season, based on things like injuries and rotation changes, and those go into our team notes and ratings. We had a +4.0 or higher power rating adjustment on five teams. Two high seeds were still big underdogs (No. 14 Montana and No. 15 Omaha). The other three were:
- No. 12 Colorado State (beat No. 5 Memphis by double digits, then lost a game to No. 4 Maryland on a buzzer beater);
- No. 11 Drake (beat No. 6 Missouri, then lost to No. 3 Texas Tech);
- No. 1 Florida (won national title).
Unfortunately, the bracket muted our position on Colorado State, as they would have likely shown up as advancing deeper (we rarely had them advance after the second round) in some different seeding scenarios.
Our adjustment on Florida, though, might have been profitable if enough subscribers had played the alternate brackets.
Florida was not the second choice when we compared the average projections of other objective rating systems. They initially ranked fourth among the No. 1 seeds. But our assessment of Florida was that they were significantly better than their full-season numbers, as they got off to a slow start in November but had been much more dominant since. We also noted that their single-worst performance came in a game where Walter Clayton Jr. suffered an early ankle injury and tried to return and play through it.
If we had been closer to the projection rating systems, coupled with their high popularity, our brackets would have had more of a fade on Florida without our assessment that they were the second-best team.
If anything, we may have lost an opportunity for more value because the opinion on Florida changed dramatically when they won the SEC Tournament title. By the start of the NCAA Tournament, they were a more popular public pick. A week earlier, we took a contrarian position that they were better than Auburn (something that did not switch in the betting futures markets until post-bracket release) and listed “Florida to win the SEC title” as a value play in our conference tournament betting picks.
5) Few Upsets Hurt Specialty Scoring Entries
Finally, the overall chalkiness of the brackets likely led to worse-than-typical performances in some pool types. We often advise playing different types of pools, as it creates some natural diversity in how you play brackets. In some years, like 2025, when the best teams win, the strategy for smaller pools and standard scoring turns out better. In others, when there are more crazy runs and some upsets with value picks going deeper, things like seed-based scoring pools can perform better.
This year, some of those specialty pools may have had deeper runs by teams like No. 8 Gonzaga, No. 8 Louisville, No. 11 North Carolina, or No. 12 Colorado State that did not materialize. They also tended to have Duke as champion but built more value scenarios around Duke than our standard brackets, so the Duke loss was likely fatal for many still alive late in the tournament.
Wrapping It Up
Playing in bracket contests is very risky business, especially when one or two game results don’t go your way and spell doom for your bracket. We saw that play out with Duke, who looked like the best team in the tournament entering the Final Four, losing a game improbably after it looked like they were in control. In any given year, even the smartest strategies can fail miserably.
Over the long term, picks that strike the best balance of risk and contrarian value based on your pool’s characteristics will generate the best returns. But even then, there are typically some very close calls to make for key picks like your NCAA champion, and the results of those close calls can spell the difference between winning and losing.
The 2025 NCAA champion ended up being the second-highest rated team, which did not have to face the tournament favorite in the final. The runner-up was also a highly rated No. 1 seed.
Our best guess is that the outcome ended up muting some of our win rates, which could have been astronomical and one of the best years we would have had if Duke had won. However, our subscribers may still post reasonably good rates of placing in prize positions, with the final numbers dependent on just how many played the alternate brackets that had Florida winning.
This year again provides a good illustration of why we suggest playing a portfolio of brackets across different pool sizes and scoring systems each year. The smartest picks for differently sized pools are rarely the same, and if you cast a broader net, you’re more likely to catch a win in at least one pool. We also do not want to tell any of you individually NOT to pick Duke when our read was that they were the favorite and not too popular, but we also know that the most likely scenario is that no one team will win the title. So, picking Florida was a reasonable counter to any Duke brackets.
Thanks and We Hope to See You Back
If you were an NCAA Bracket Picks subscriber in 2025, we appreciate your business. Our commitment to you is that we will continue to improve our research and strategies every year to deliver winning long-term results.
In these types of pools, we expect the performance of our recommended picks to vary widely from year to year and from subscriber to subscriber within a single year. We know it can be frustrating if you go multiple years without winning a pool, but that is the nature of this beast.
Since we started collecting the data in 2015 across thousands of real-world bracket pools, our subscribers have won prizes more than three times as often as expected. We’re proud of that performance, which shows that trusting the process eventually pays off.
Have a great summer, and we hope to see you back for March Madness 2026!
Reminder: If you used the NCAA Bracket Picks product this year, please complete our subscriber survey if one is available to you, so we can collect real-world data on how our brackets performed.
P.S. If you want to read some of our past yearly bracket picks recaps, you can check them out at the links below: