President Obama's 2024 March Madness bracket revealed
One of the world's most famous basketball fans revealed his 2024 NCAA basketball tournament brackets. Former President Barack Obama shared his March Madness bracket exclusively on "CBS Mornings" Tuesday, and he explained why he makes his picks public each year.
For the final four of the men's tournament, Obama chose UConn, Kentucky, Baylor and Purdue, with UConn and Kentucky in the final and UConn winning for the second straight year.
For the women's final four, he has South Carolina, Stanford, USC and and Iowa, with South Carolina and Iowa in the finals and South Carolina winning.
Obama has publicly released his bracket every year since taking office in 2009. "He completely gets it wrong every time," CBS News' Vlad Duthiers remarked while sharing the brackets on "CBS Mornings." "He only got it right once, but he says it's all part of his master plan."
On the "Ways to Win" podcast, hosted by his brother-in-law Craig Robinson, Obama explained why he releases his brackets.
"My attitude is, you know, it gives people great pleasure with all the intelligence I have available to me – you know, the CIA, the NSA, all of that input – when they beat me, they feel good. I want to give people that satisfaction," he joked.
Obama predicted the winner of the 2009 NCAA tournament – North Carolina – and people were impressed of the new president's basketball knowledge.
"They thought, 'Look at the president of the United States. He's in the top 4% of all the people who enter in their brackets publicly.' And I was kind of feeling it, and I thought, 'You know what, I think this is what's going to happen every year,'" he said on the podcast. "And I'm pretty sure each year I've lost since then. So, I have not necessarily picked a winner [lately]."
UConn – which won the title five times in 25 years – is a "traditional pick," former NBA star Charles Barkley told "CBS Mornings" anchor Gayle King on their CNN show "King Charles."
"Everyone is picking UConn," said Barkley, an 11-time NBA All-Star. "So [Obama] is just copying off someone else's paper."
Barkely also criticized Obama's women's bracket: "See, he just went chalk. He picked South Carolina because everybody in the world picks South Carolina."
President Biden also released his bracket and had UConn as the champions. He has UConn, Houston, North Carolina and Tennessee as his final four in the men's tournament and for the women's tournament: South Carolina, UCLA, Stanford and UConn – with South Carolina winning in the end against UCLA.
The odds of a perfect bracket are 1 in 120 billion. But two Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduates attempted to build a computer model that would beat the odds. "Picking the teams that are going to win that are like the favorites, that will get you an OK bracket. But if you want to win, you gotta pick the upsets. That's the secret sauce," Tauhid Zaman told Duthiers last year.
If you don't have access to such technology, Shawn Chao recommends keeping an eye on the first round, saying there are "typically" about "10 upsets or so."
"Some of the most common upsets are the sixth-ranked team and the 11th-ranked team, where the 11th-ranked team actually beats the sixth-ranked team about 3/7 of the time," Chao said.
CBS and TBS will televise 21 games each during the NCAA Tournament, while truTV and TNT will carry 13 and 12, respectively.
