It's March Madness time circa 2024, and the tournament is set to start on Thursday March 21st.  Which also means it is betting madness time.  Brackets are filled out by millions on websites like CBS Sports or ESPN, and I am no exception.  My Temple Owls will not be participating again this year in the tournament, unfortunately.  They lost the American Conference tournament championship game to the University of Alabama, Birmingham (UAB).  

This was after the Owls played and won on four consecutive days, each of which they were the underdog.  

You might ask, favored by who?  Well, the sports books like the ones in Las Vegas casinos, as well as online betting websites such as FanDuel and DraftKings.  They set the betting lines for all games.  In order to win, a bettor must pick the team they think will cover the betting line.  For example, if Team A plays Team B, and Team B is favored to win by 6 points, then if the bettor bets on Team B, it must indeed win by six points.  Otherwise, the bettors that bet on Team A win the bet, even though the team they picked lost the game.

Which brings us to the perplexing part.  On a game prior to the regional tournaments, there was an anomoly.  On March 7, Temple played UAB.  In one Vegas casino, UAB was favored by only 1.5 points on the morning of the game.  Then, in the afternoon, the line moved to 8 points.  That is considered very irregular.  So odd in fact that the most prominent sports betting watchdog organization - U.S. Integrity - saw it and sent out an alert. UAB won the game, 100-72, but the damage was done.

This event has stained the Temple basketball program through the regional tournament, and up to the rematch with UAB on March 17.  One has to wonder why the UAB basketball program wasn't similary stained.

So what causes such a swing in the betting line?  The most common reason is that somebody has provided some bettors with some inside information about a player that will affect the game, such as an undisclosed injury or even a plan by the coach to bench a player (for whatever reason). Organizations like U.S. Integrity monitor all sports books for betting line swings such as this one, and report out any strange movement in the line to the team, league, and media organizations.  

The other possible reason is that an official for that particular game was "on the take."  This is presumbly very rare, and so I doubt that this was the reason for the line swing. So who is the inside information source?  What piece of information was enough to move the betting line so much?  This is still being investigated.  Perhaps we'll never know.

Meanwhile, who one the game on March 17?  UAB won easily, 85-69.  UAB was only favored by 6.5 points this time.

When I look back on this season of Temple basketball, I see a team that is trying to establish an identity.  Prior to the season they lost some key players to the transfer portal.  On the bright side, even though they had lost 10 in a row at one point this season, they were still able to win 4 games in a row leading up to their big chance to make it into the Big Dance.  The UAB line swing scandal is going to follow this team for a while, and may affect recruiting.  That is unfortunate, as it has been a long while since this program made it into the NCAA tournament.  As an alum myself who has followed Temple basketball since the days when John Cheney was the coach, I would love to see some of the greatness from those years again.

Some of my pictures of Temple University in Philadelphia, in case you were curious...