NCAA Basketball: Picks and Best Bets for the 2024/25 Championship

The 2024 NCAA tournament has concluded, and even though the confetti hasn’t been cleared off the hardwood yet, 2025 championship odds have been released. Next year’s iteration of the tournament is set to begin March 18, 2025, and will end April 7 in San Antonio.

Now that we are fully into the offseason, there will be a ton of moving pieces via the transfer portal and draft declarations. This will inevitably cause a shift in these odds but the teams that have a legitimate chance to cut down the nets next year won’t change all that much before the 24-25 season tips off.

Let’s take a look at the current odds that can be found over on FanDuel Sportsbook:

As you can see, we have our usual cast of characters up top with the Duke Blue Devils and the Kansas Jayhawks, but there are a handful of others that present us with potential as well as value. Here are five teams that have the best opportunity to win a national title in 2025.

2024-2025 NCAA Tournament Favorites

Houston Cougars

+1500

I firmly believe Houston would have been a Final Four team if not for an injury to veteran leader Jamal Shead. They were in control of Duke in the first half of their Sweet 16 matchup, but the wheels fell off without their star point guard. The Cougars will have the chance to wipe away the bad taste of that loss in the upcoming season with a strong group of core players returning.

Kelvin Sampson is a great coach who runs a consistently competitive program. He is one of the few coaches out there that can maintain discipline while also being someone that kids genuinely want to play for each year. He has had fewer than five key players transfer out of the program since pandemic hit. In today’s era of the portal, that is a truly impressive accomplishment.

Seniors J’Wan Roberts (9.5 PPG, 6.8 RPG) and L.J. Cryer (15.5 PPG, 39% 3-Pt shooter) have already indicated they’ll be back for one last ride, which puts them in the conversation of being a preseason top 5 squad. Meanwhile, it’s widely expected that Manny Sharp (12.6 PPG, 37% 3-Pt shooter) and Ja’Vier Francis (6 PPG, 5.2 RPG) will return as well, with both likely taking a huge step forward after another Summer of development. Joe Tugler will be back for his sophomore season after his freshman year ended prematurely with a broken foot. Tugler flashed star potential at times and is going to be one of the players atop my breakout list.

Incoming freshmen Mercy Miller and Chase McCarty are a pair of 4-star recruits that will shore up the overall depth for coach Sampson. In case you’re wondering, Mercy Miller is another of Master P’s sons and has already cemented several NIL deals totaling over $1 million. 

The big question will be whether Jamal Shead decides to utilize his pandemic year or not. He has been a part of four straight Sweet 16s and if he chooses to spurn the NBA for one more year, the Cougars would be one of the favorites to win it all. However, Sampson has publicly commented that they’ll be active in the portal which has been a key part of his roster building process for years. That means the Cougars will be well positioned to make a Final Four run even if Shead moves onto the next chapter of his basketball life.

Kansas Jayhawks

+1200

The Jayhawks lost a slew of highly rated freshmen to the portal last year due to lack of playing time, which clearly hurt their depth, but they looked like a Final Four team for a large portion of the year. Injuries piled up due to the wear and tear of playing 5-6 guys 30-plus minutes, and they ultimately fizzled out in the second round with Kevin McCullar unable to play at all during the tournament. Say what you will about how the year ended for Kansas, but I will never doubt a team coached by the legendary Bill Self.

Kevin McCullar is gone, and Johnny Furphy is projected as a late first-rounder, so it would be wise for him to make the pro jump in what is considered by many to be a weak draft. It would be a setback for most teams to lose two of its top four scorers, but the Jayhawks aren’t most teams. Forward KJ Adams (12.6 PPG) and point guard Dajuan Harris (8.5 PPG, 6.5 APG) have confirmed they’ll be back, while star center Hunter Dickinson (17.9 PPG, 10.9 RPG) is still mulling his options. Getting him back will be crucial to where Kansas ultimately falls in college basketball’s pecking order, but they aren’t sitting around waiting while other programs snatch up prospects.

Self’s staff has been one of the more active groups in the offseason and have already added South Dakota State transfer Zeke Mayo (18.8 PPG, 5.7 RPG, 3.5 APG) and ex-Florida guard Riley Kugel (9.2 PPG, 3.5 RPG). They have also signed 5-star center Flory Bidunga and a pair of 4-stars in Labaron Philon and Rakease Passmore. All of these pieces will push them forward but they’re far from done when it comes to adding talent to the roster. Bill Self is college basketball royalty, and I’m confident Kansas will be back in the title picture in 2024-25. 

Duke Blue Devils

+1100

A blueblood program like Duke is expected to always challenge for a championship, and it’s not uncommon to see them atop odds and preseason top 25 polls. Jon Scheyer is 54-18 in two seasons since taking over for Coach K, which is much better than non-Duke fans give him credit for. Scheyer has proven he belongs after an Elite Eight appearance.

Duke is currently over the scholarship limit by two, but they’re still waiting on decisions from several players when it comes to the draft or the portal. They have a historic recruiting class coming in that includes six players in the top 50, five in the top 20. It’s the most top-50 recruits in a single class since Kentucky in 2017.

Starter Mark Mitchell (11.6 PPG, 6 RPG) and little used reserve Christian Reeves have hit the portal while Kyle Filipkowski (16.4 PPG, 8.3 RPG) is almost certainly going to enter the NBA draft. That means they’ll be integrating a lot of youth during an era which requires veterans to win in March. I’m expecting at least two of Jeremy Roach (14 PPG, 3.3 APG), Jared McCain (14.3 PPG), Tyrese Proctor (10.5 PPG) and Caleb Foster (7.7 PPG) to return which will help anchor a younger roster. TJ Power and Sean Stewart should be back as well with both showing enough this past season to indicate they’ll be heavily in the rotation for next year.

Cooper Flagg (No. 1 recruit), Khaman Maluach (No. 3), Isaiah Evans (No. 12), Kon Knueppel (No. 17), Patrick Ngongba (No. 18) and Darren Harris (No. 51) make up the vaunted freshmen class. Flagg looks like the real deal and will have a ton of hype leading up to the season, and as long as a couple of their veteran guards return, Duke will be a championship-caliber squad. 

UConn Huskies

+1800

A lot of pundits had written off the Huskies after winning the tournament last year because they would be losing five key players from that team. On top of that, it’s extremely hard to repeat at the collegiate level — the last time we saw it happen was back in 2007 when Billy Donovan’s Florida Gators did it with a veteran-laden squad. Fast forward to this week, and UConn pulled off the unthinkable. The Huskies repeating as champs was arguably more impressive than Florida or Duke going back-to-back, because they did it with a fairly different roster. 

Make no mistake about it, UConn is a blue blood and Dan Hurley is one of the best college basketball coaches in America. That said, people didn’t learn their lesson and are once again doubting the Huskies chances of winning another title. Yes, the losses of Donovan Clingan (13 PPG, 7.4 RPG, 2.5 BPG) and Stephon Castle (11.1 PPG, 4.7 RPG, 2.9 APG) to the draft will hurt. It’s even more painful when you consider the fact that Tristen Newton (15.1 PPG, 6.6 RPG, 6.2 APG), Cam Spencer (14.3 PPG, 4.9 RPG, 3.6 APG) and Hassan Diarra (6.1 PPG) have exhausted their eligibility. However, there is simply no reason to think Hurley won’t have this team right back in the mix for a Final Four and beyond.

Alex Karaban (13.3 PPG, 5.1 RPG) is likely back and will try to win a third championship in as many seasons while Jaylin Stewart enters his sophomore season as a massive breakout candidate. Hurley is so confident in Stewart that he mentioned several times during tourney pressers he was looking forward to seeing him take over next season. The elite recruiting class from last year will also return Solo Ball, Jayden Ross and Youssouf Singare.

The Huskies will be adding players via the portal as well, as their recruiting pitch just got a whole lot easier with another piece of hardware in the trophy case. Don’t overlook a program with a championship window that won’t be closing anytime soon.

Iowa State Cyclones

+4000

We are getting great value on the Cyclones at +4000. They won 29 games this past season and earned a 2-seed in the NCAA tournament. TJ Otzelberger is a rising star in the coaching world and will look to make another step forward with a roster that will be led by returning back court Keshon Gilbert (13.7 PPG, 4.4 RPG, 4.2 APG, 2 SPG) and Tamin Lipsey (12.4 PPG, 4.6 RPG, 4.9 APG, 2.7 SPG). Milan Momcilovic is also expected back and will be a prime candidate to explode as a sophomore and build on his reputation as being a dangerous 3-point shooter.

Reserves Omaha Biliew and Jackson Paveletzke have entered the portal, but the Cyclones have already added a trio of players that will be in the rotation. Charlotte transfer Dishon Jackson (11.4 PPG, 6.1 RPG) will be set to play big minutes immediately as the team loses Robert Jones, Tre King and Hason Ward to graduation. Seattle transfer Brandon Chatfield (9.4 PPG, 5.4 RPG) and UNI transfer Nate Heise (13.5 PPG, 6.1 RPG) are solid additions as well. 

Iowa State’s defense will once again be upper echelon, but they’ll need to make major strides offensively to be considered a contender, rather than a pretender. The value here is just too good to pass up for a team returning their top players at key positions.