The No. 15 seed Oral Roberts Golden Eagles pulled off a shocking upset over the No. 2 seed Ohio State Buckeyes on Friday in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. While the Buckeyes losing to a 15-seed shocked everybody (Ohio State was a 16-point favorite), it had to really be surprising to one bettor.
According to Allan Bell of CBS Sportsline, a Nevada bettor at the William Hill Sportsbook bet $100,000 on Ohio State to win the NCAA Tournament right before Friday’s game. Ohio State had +2000 odds, so a $100,000 bet would result in winning $2 million if the Buckeyes were able to win the tournament.
A Nevada bettor at @WilliamHillUS just put down $100,000 on Ohio State to win the NCAA Tournament at +2000.
Bettor would win $2 MILLION!#MarchMadness
— Allan Bell (@AllanGBell) March 19, 2021
Instead, Ohio State couldn’t even get past a No. 15 seed. Ouch.
Now, Ohio State making a deep run wouldn’t have really surprised anybody. They were a No. 2 seed for a reason. Even after the loss to Oral Roberts, the Buckeyes come in at No. 9 on Ken Pomeroy’s rankings, and No. 4 overall in his offensive efficiency rankings. They also played in arguably — if not the Big 12 — the toughest conference in America this season, and had wins over current No. 1 seeds Illinois and Michigan.
However, they’ve looked vulnerable at times, most notably during a five-game losing streak that began less than a month ago. And Friday’s loss to a team that finished fourth in the Summit League regular-season standings obviously showed off that vulnerability to a whole new level.
We can assume that whoever could afford to throw down $100,000 on this bet can survive the losses, but this was a questionable investment that immediately went quite poorly.
