It's New Orleans. It's the Final Four. It's Coach K's final ride. And with all of those things comes sky-high ticket prices and the culmination of a landmark wave of legalized sports betting.
So it's only fitting that those games kick off on a court within the Caesars Superdome a re-christened arena that reflects the new sports landscape and a company at the center of it all.
“It’s going to be a great moment for Caesars, and look it’s one of the biggest sporting events of the year and it should be great basketball," said Assistant Director of Trading Adam Pullen.
“I’ve been to a lot of Final Fours, but there’s nothing like one in New Orleans.”
From a betting perspective, the Final Four will roll in much like the Super Bowl, with an array of bet menus, prop action and non-traditional outlets to bet the games. That lineup will feature 2-seed Duke and 8-seed North Carolina facing off, somehow, for the first time ever in the NCAA Tournament in what will be legendary coach Mike Kryzsewki's final game (or two). On the other side of the bracket it's another set of bluebloods in 2-seed Villanova and 1-seed Kansas.
Among the many events slated for the city, Caesars will be hosting a viewing part above Champions Square before the games on April 2 and 4, as well as a viewing party at Walk-Ons on Poydras Street ahead of the semifinal matchups, complete with a promo code (NOLAMM) to land a free bet option.
And those viewing parties could come in handy, considering the high-gravity of the teams in the Final Four have driven ticket prices to the highest totals in tournament history, according to TicketIQ. The get-in price for the semifinals was tracking just shy of $400 this week, a steep climb from the $281 for the last full-attendance event in Minneapolis in 2019. That price floor was $191 back in 2012, the last time the event was held in New Orleans.
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The championship game is tracking slightly lower at $256, though that would likely skyrocket should Duke take down North Carolina, with the game then marking a ride-off-into-the-sunset opportunity for Coach K, who announced this would be his final season.
So what are the current betting lines? Kansas currently sits as 4.5-point favorites over Villanova, per Caesars, and Duke is a 4-point favorite over UNC.
As Pullen notes, the public money typically rides with the favorites in the early rounds, but that will shift as underdogs like Saint Peter's land upsets and grab the public attention and interest. But there's no Cinderella in this year's Final Four, with UNC unceremoniously dumping the Peacocks in the Elite Eight, simply premiere matchups to drive the first true NCAA Tournament of sports wagering to new heights.
“It’s just going to keep growing at crazy rates as we move on year after year," Pullen said. "It’s going to be the same story. … It’s just going to get bigger and bigger.”