Tshiebwe and Wheeler returning equals Kentucky winning 2023 NCAA title?
Coincidentally or not, five days after Oscar Tshiebwe announced he would play next season for Kentucky and just a day after Sahvir Wheeler did the same, the Wildcats have been upgraded to the favorite to win the 2023 national championship.
The gambling website BetOnline.ag made Kentucky an 8-1 favorite in its odds updated Monday. Tshiebwe, who led the nation in rebounding and was Kentucky’s leading scorer, became the first UK player to sweep the National Player of the Year awards. Wheeler was third in the country in assists and was a finalist for the Bob Cousy Point Guard of the Year Award.
The previous odds listed on April 5 had Kentucky as an 11-1 second choice to win the 2023 NCAA Tournament along with Duke and Gonzaga.
Arkansas was a 10-1 favorite to win the 2023 NCAA Tournament in the previous odds. The Razorbacks and North Carolina are the new second choices at odds of 10-1. Houston is next at 12-1 and Duke follows at 14-1.
The odds of Kansas winning a second straight national championship lengthened slightly from 14-1 on April 5 to 16-1 in Monday’s update.
In its initial odds set this time last year, BetOnline.ag made Gonzaga a 9-1 favorite to win the 2022 NCAA Tournament. Baylor and UCLA were second choices at 12-1.
None of the three advanced to the Final Four.
Eventual national champion Kansas was tied for the 11th-best odds at 18-1. The other team with those odds was Kentucky.
The initial odds set for the three other teams that eventually advanced to the Final Four were 14-1 (Villanova), 16-1 (Duke) and 25-1 (North Carolina).
Saint Peter’s, the Cinderella story of the 2022 NCAA Tournament by advancing to the Elite Eight, was not among the 100 teams listed in the initial odds. The longest odds at this time a year ago for a 2022 championship was 500-1: DePaul and Boston College.
This story was originally published April 25, 2022 at 4:14 PM.
