2018 NCAA Tournament: No. 1 Virginia Cavaliers best odds to win it all in FiveThirtyEight and Bart Torvik predictive models

The official 2018 NCAA tournament bracket has been revealed, and as expected, the Virginia Cavaliers were announced as the No. 1 seed overall and the top team in the South Region. Cincinnati, Tennessee, Arizona, and Kentucky round out the top five seeds in the South.

Take a deep breath, Wahoo fans. I’ll be the first to admit there were some swear words uttered when Arizona and Kentucky were announced, but to be the best you have to beat good teams. Once things settled a bit and the bracket picture became clearer and the matchups started to unfold, the predictions started to roll in favoring the Hoos.

FiveThirtyEight’s predictive model gives Virginia the best chance at winning the whole thing with an 18% chance at becoming the National Champion. They also say there’s almost a 50% chance of the Hoos finally breaking through and making the Final Four.

Villanova is second with a slightly better shot at the Final Four (right at 50%), but the Hoos have a slightly better chance at making the championship game (32% to Nova’s 29%) and winning it all (18% to Nova’s 17%) per their model.

Bart Torvik, the hip new analytics guru to stand alongside longtime Virginia favorite Ken Pomeroy, also has Virginia with a good chance of not only making the Final Four, but winning the whole dang thing.

Torvik has the Hoos with a 98.2% chance to make the Sweet Sixteen, an 83.6% chance of making the Elite Eight, a 47.7% chance of Making the Final Four (!!!), a 35.5% at making the championship game, and a 22.6% chance at winning it all. Virginia had the highest chances out of all four regions.

The next closest was again Villanova with a 40.2% chance at the Final Four, 24.8% chance at the championship game, and a 14.5% chance at getting their second natty in three years.

Does that seem high? What’s your take? Commence celebrating and/or panicking and leave a comment below!