The Globe and Mail talked to one Toronto lawyer who had only one wrong pick in the first two rounds and won his office pool last season. The self-professed March Madness junkie suggests how to win your office pool:
Ride the favourites early
"One of the things, clearly, is there's never been a situation in the first round where a 16 team has beaten a No. 1 seed. There's only been four instances in history where a 15 has beat a two [seed], so it's pretty safe to pick ones and twos."
Know your conferences
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"It's very rare to have more than one school from the same conference playing in the Final Four. You usually only see one school from a particular conference there."
Go with the big dogs
"Usually schools from the power conferences, the ones with the more difficult schedules during the year — the ACC, the Big East, the Pac 10 — they're the ones that make it the farthest in the tournament on a year-to-year basis."
How to pick an upset
"The only ways to really gauge an upset well, other than sheer luck, is actually knowing a lot about the teams themselves and doing some background research. Really look at the matchups and do a little bit of reading."
Ultimately, anyone can win
"At the end of the day, it really comes down to luck. It's a one and done tournament."
