2025 NCAA Tournament Survivor Pool Advice: Round 1 (Friday)

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In yesterday’s column, we discussed the differences between an NCAA tournament survivor pool and a more traditional NFL survivor pool. Many of the strategies are different, and contestants should be aware of all rules and nuances before entering. An NCAA survivor pool takes much more future planning, whereas one can win an NFL survivor pool by taking a week-to-week approach.

Though no first round games have officially been played yet, we are giving you our planning advice well before the first set of games so you can plan accordingly. And if you do not feel like waiting until the First Four games conclude to make your selections, you should be able to find great picks from the remaining 14 games.

Throughout the tournament, one has to make eight picks: two from the First Round (one for each day played), two from the Second Round (one for each day played), and one from the Sweet 16, Elite 8, Final Four, and National Championship.

Each round, we will provide our analysis broken down by the following categories: Best Picks, Favorites on Upset Alert, and Teams That Should be Saved for Later Use.

2025 NCAA Tournament March Madness Bracket Strategy & Betting Picks>>

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2025 March Madness Survivor Pool Advice: Round 1 (Friday)

Here is a list of odds (via DraftKings Sportsbook) for all the favorites to win their first-round matchups on Friday:

(odds courtesy of DraftKings Sportsbook)

Best Round 1 Survivor Picks for Friday

Iowa State’s Final Four and national championship aspirations were dealt a huge blow when the team announced that Keshon Gilbert would miss the entire NCAA Tournament with a groin injury. Gilbert is Iowa State’s second-leading scorer averaging 13.4 points per game, and was also the team’s assist leader at 4.1 per game. While the Cyclones are not in huge jeopardy of losing to Lipscomb in the first round, they could find themselves as underdogs in every other game they play, starting with a potential Round of 32 game against Ole Miss.

Akron allows a 68th percentile transition rate, which is asking for trouble against a Tommy Lloyd-coached Arizona team that wants to run at every opportunity. Arizona should also be able to take advantage of its size after playing to an 85th percentile rim rate and 87th percentile finishing rate, per Synergy.

Do not be fooled by Akron's MAC-best 2-point defense that allowed opponents to shoot just 48.8% from inside the arc. Against the only team that finished inside KenPom's top 50 (Saint Mary's), the Gaels burned the Zips for 61 points at the rim. Akron went 0-2 against NCAA Tournament teams that earned No. 7 and No. 13 seeds (Saint Mary's and Yale), losing by an average of 17.5 points in those games. Thus, I do not believe the Wildcats an danger of a first round upset.

Favorites on Upset Alert

  • Kentucky (-800)
  • Maryland (-575)
  • Oregon (-310)
  • UConn (-230)
  • Saint Mary’s (-192)
  • Marquette (-175)
  • Colorado State (-130)
  • Mississippi State (-120)
  • North Car0lina (-118)
  • Illinois (Odds TBD)

Teams That Should Be Saved for Later

Florida, Duke, Alabama, and Michigan State are all Elite 8 contenders, at the very least. So while no team from this list is in danger of a first-round upset, keep them handy for the later rounds when they are still prohibitive favorites while fewer teams are available to choose from.

Mike Spector is a featured writer at BettingPros. For more from Mike, check out his archive and follow him @MikeSpector01.