Local books benefit as favorites tumble

Spencer Patterson

Monday, March 15, 1999 | 10:58 a.m.

Watch out for the underdogs or you might get bitten.

That's the lesson local bettors learned as the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament whittled the field from 64 to 16 teams over the weekend.

After just four days of March Madness, nine No. 2, 3 or 4 seeds have been eliminated, while many of the other favorites have been taken to the wire.

And that underdog-heavy trend tends to favor Las Vegas sports books.

"When favorites cover a lot of games the sports book can get hurt," William Walkowski, an MGM Grand race & sports supervisor, said. "But when underdogs stay close or win, it's to the sports books' benefit."

"The tournament has been good for the house," agreed Rob Terry, director of race & sports at Palace Station. "Especially (Sunday), when seven of eight underdogs won or covered the spread, that favors the house."

On the flip side, Glenn Sharp, race & sports director at Mandalay Bay, said that after three days of heavy betting on favorites, his clientele began looking to the dogs.

"Everybody loves favorites in this town, but it seemed like (Sunday) the crowd went for the underdogs," Sharp said. "Maybe they adjusted after the first three days."

The only favorite that managed to cover Sunday did so comfortably, as No. 1 Duke rolled past Tulsa, 97-56. Most books had the Blue Devils at around a 23-point pick.

Duke's back-to-back 41-point wins, coupled with losses by fellow East Region top seeds Miami, Cincinnati and Tennessee, have combined to make the Blue Devils more prohibitive favorites than ever to win the 1999 championship.

Caesars Palace has Duke as a 1-to-3 choice to win the title and an overwhelming 1-to-25 pick to win an East Region without another top five seed remaining. The Blue Devils also are a 27-point favorite at Caesars in their upcoming game against Southwest Missouri State.

"The Duke point spreads really exemplify the saying, 'There's no such thing as a meaningless basket,' " said Vince Magliulo, director of sports at Caesars.

"Duke's region is basically right there on a silver platter," Terry said. "Duke and UConn can pretty much buy their tickets to the Final Four."

Nevertheless, book supervisors said Duke's huge point spreads have not prevented heavy action on the Blue Devils thus far, with Sunday's Duke-Tulsa tilt among the most popular matchups.

Another game that received heavy two-way action lived up to the hype, as Kentucky and Kansas battled to overtime before the Wildcats picked up a 92-88 win in the first-ever tournament meeting between the schools. But the Jayhawks did cover the spread.

With No. 2 seed Utah and No. 4 seed Arizona out of the way, defending champion Kentucky is now a 7-to-2 choice to win the Midwest, slightly behind favored Michigan State (7-to-5).

In the South Region -- the only region with all four top seeds remaining -- Maryland is the favorite to reach the Final Four at 8-to-5.