{"id":699103,"date":"2026-04-05T05:11:28","date_gmt":"2026-04-05T05:11:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/699103\/"},"modified":"2026-04-05T05:11:28","modified_gmt":"2026-04-05T05:11:28","slug":"mens-college-basketball-national-championship-odds-michigan-is-favored-by-how-much","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/699103\/","title":{"rendered":"Men\u2019s college basketball national championship odds: Michigan is favored by how much?!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Both Michigan and UConn got off to hot starts in Saturday\u2019s Final Four games. The Huskies had to endure a push from Illinois while the Wolverines ran away from Arizona. Considering Michigan\u2019s dominant play, it\u2019s no surprise the Wolverines are big favorites for Monday\u2019s national championship game.<\/p>\n<p>Michigan is favored by 7.5 points on DraftKings, BetMGM and FanDuel. The Wolverines opened as a 6.5-point favorite on FanDuel, but that number quickly moved so that all three sportsbooks showed matching odds.<\/p>\n<p>Both UConn and Michigan were underdogs, albeit very small ones, in the final betting lines for the semifinals. Dan Hurley\u2019s team gets to play up the disrespect card despite this being the Huskies\u2019 third national title game appearance in the last four years.<\/p>\n<p>If the line closes at 7.5, Michigan would be the biggest favorite in a title game since North Carolina was a 7.5-point favorite against Michigan State in 2009. The Tar Heels won that game by 17. UConn was a 7-point favorite against Purdue in the 2024 championship game and a 6.5-point favorite against San Diego State in the 2023 final, winning both.<\/p>\n<p>The biggest recorded upsets in title game history, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.covers.com\/sportsoddshistory\/cbb-final-four\/?fd=&amp;cfd=&amp;ou=&amp;rd=nc\" rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">SportsOddsHistory.com<\/a>, are UConn\u2019s 1999 win against Duke and Villanova\u2019s famous 1985 upset of Georgetown. Both UConn and Villanova were 9.5-point underdogs.<\/p>\n<p>Michigan enters as the clear favorite thanks to its dominant play this NCAA Tournament. The Wolverines\u2019 closest game was a 13-point win against Alabama in the Sweet 16. Even in that game, Michigan led by at least 10 points for the last seven minutes. Dusty May\u2019s team led Arizona by as many as 30 points on Saturday and beat Tennessee by 33 in the Elite Eight.<\/p>\n<p>Program history is strongly on UConn\u2019s side, though. Not only did the Huskies win back-to-back national titles in 2023 and 2024, but UConn has won all six of its national championships since Michigan won its only title in 1989. The Wolverines are 1-6 in title games, including four straight losses in 1992, 1993, 2013 and 2018. Meanwhile, UConn is 6-0 in championship games.<\/p>\n<p>As for this year\u2019s matchup, Yaxel Lendeborg, the betting favorite to win the tournament\u2019s Most Outstanding Player award, suffered an ankle injury in the 18-point win over Arizona. Lendeborg initially left the game, but did later return. It\u2019s hard to imagine he won\u2019t play on Monday, considering he came back on Saturday, but his health will be worth monitoring early in Monday\u2019s game.<\/p>\n<p>The point total is listed at 145.5 on FanDuel and BetMGM and 144.5 on DraftKings. Michigan has gone way above that total in all of its NCAA Tournament games, while UConn has been around or below that range in its last four games.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Both Michigan and UConn got off to hot starts in Saturday\u2019s Final Four games. The Huskies had to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":699104,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3724],"tags":[7,6133,354,1043,215],"class_list":{"0":"post-699103","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-connecticut-huskies","10":"tag-mens-college-basketball","11":"tag-michigan-wolverines","12":"tag-sports-betting"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116350387046238091","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699103","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=699103"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699103\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/699104"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=699103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=699103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=699103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}