It’s easy to forget, but, once the first whistle blows, sports are supposed to be fun. There are too few hours in the day and too many other obligations to willingly sit down and spend multiple hours voluntarily doing something we dislike.
Right? Well, maybe that wasn’t the case over the past few weeks.
On one hand, there’s been plenty of chatter that the tournament was boring. The favorites were too good, and a Final Four consisting of all four No. 1 seeds only confirmed that. Games were too one-sided, and we didn’t see any true Cinderellas crash the party.
We heard that talking point on TV–Stephen A. Smith bombastically worried that college basketball as we know it could be dying–and saw it on social media. Even Newsweek’s own readers largely agreed. But, at the same time, there were dissenting voices.
“I certainly would disagree with all those that stated that the tournament has been boring due to all the power schools dominating the action,” Vitale told Newsweek by email ahead of the Final Four. “We have witnessed some brilliant play by the stars in the game such as Cooper Flagg and Johni Broome as well as the fierce competitiveness between the various elite teams has been superb.”
Jamie Squire/Getty Images
So, with one game remaining in 2025 March Madness, what does that mean for this tournament? Let’s deconstruct things a little bit.
People Like Underdogs
To start things off, let’s consider Cinderella teams and upsets. While that feels like something intangible, the NCAA does officially define an upset as “when the winner of the game was seeded five or more places lower than the team it defeated.”
When we apply that framework to the 2025 bracket, it leaves us with four upsets: Drake over Missouri, Colorado State over Memphis, McNeese over Clemson and Arkansas over St. John’s. Three of those took place in the First Round; the fourth took place in the Round of 32.
Could you argue that the NCAA’s guidelines are a bit too strict? Maybe, especially when you consider part of the “madness” that we witness during the early days of the tournament is tied to bracket-busting, and a nine-over-eight upset can still throw off your picks. But at the same time, we know that people, especially sports fans, have an emotional tie to the underdog.
Ahead of the Super Bowl, Newsweek spoke with three different psychologists about that very topic. They all agreed that, while a variety of different factors work behind the scenes, there’s something bigger at play.
George R. Goethals, social psychologist and professor emeritus at the University of Richmond’s Jepson School of Leadership, explained that our sympathy for the little guy isn’t just about teams or individuals.
“We did a study that just showed moving geometric shapes,” he said. “And they’re little circles rolling along a line. There’s several variations but there’s a big one that moves after the little one that appears to be chasing it….People are just watching geometric shapes, but they think of one as weaker and struggling. If you ask people who they root for, they immediately say the one that looks like it’s weaker and struggling,” he told Newsweek ahead of the Big Game.
“And as we said, because we wrote up that study, it’s remarkable. Maybe the most remarkable thing is [that] when you ask people ‘Which one are you rooting for?’ they don’t say, ‘What the hell are you talking about? What do you mean rooting for one little circle ahead of another?’ People get it. They’re so tuned into seeing struggling, weak entities, and there’s a natural sympathy that goes out for them.”
In a similar vein, both Joe Vandello and Nadav Goldschmied raised the idea of fairness. If you consider that many people feel that the deck is unfairly stacked against them, there’s some extra motivation to root for the have-not.
You can also consider the values that your allegiance implies through association. Do you want to side with the juggernaut who is naturally bigger and stronger than everyone else? Or does it feel better to identify with the scrappy underdog who’s going to battle against the odds?
When you apply all of that to March Madness, the discourse about the lack of underdogs makes sense. When we’re talking about a 68-team field, interests are divided; things get even messier when we consider the fans of programs that didn’t qualify for the tournament.
What’s something we can all cheer for? An upset. And we notice when they don’t happen.
Newsweek Readers Didn’t Care For This Year’s Tournament
ESPN talking heads are one thing, but what did the average college basketball fan think of March Madness? In an attempt to answer that, Newsweek asked readers whether they found this year’s tournament boring or not. The results, compiled ahead of the Final Four, were pretty one-sided.
Of 55 respondents, 50 said that the 2025 Men’s NCAA Tournament was boring. That’s an overwhelming 91 percent of those who voted. And those who provided an explanation were also rather uniform in their logic.
“Four number 1 seeds — boring, snooze fest,” Erick Mandt wrote in. “I will not watch. Most of the teams are from power conferences. Most fans would rather have a second or third mid major team in the tournament compared to the 12th or 13th or 14th power conference.”
“No seeds lower than 12 won a game and all of the top 2 seeds advanced past the first weekend except St. John’s,” Tom Crotty explained. “Plus there was only one true buzzer beater.”
How Do You Define Boring?
Thus far, things seem pretty cut and dried, right? We love underdogs, and fans have noticed that the favorites have largely dominated this year’s March Madness.
But there’s something else to consider: If millions of people have tuned into March Madness, that gives us a great deal of different preferences, some of which are contradictory.
To underscore that, let’s consider some previous tournament coverage.
The 2023 edition of March Madness was one of the most chaotic in recent memory. Both a No. 1 and a No. 2 seed lost in the First Round; no top-seeded team made it past the Sweet 16. The Final Four consisted of UConn, San Diego State, Florida Atlantic and Miami.
Sounds perfect, right? Turns out things weren’t universally positive.
“But here’s the thing about madness: Deep down, we all secretly want a little bit of order. And this weekend at the men’s Final Four, I think we’ll all understand why. That is, if we’re even watching,” Will Leitch at the time wrote in an Intelligencer post titled “The Year March Madness Went a Little Too Mad.”
In terms of those watching, the 2023 Tournament averaged 9.1 million viewers through the Elite Eight that year. This year’s edition averaged 9.4 million viewers through the same point, suggesting that upsets don’t automatically draw more eyeballs.
But what about the 2024 NCAA Tournament, which saw a bit more normalcy?
Some found the big vs. big battle pitting Donovan Clingan against Zach Edey an enjoyable throwback, but, again, the sentiment wasn’t universal. An Awful Announcing post, for example, compared UConn to the San Antonio Spurs “both in titles and a lack of viewers.” Elsewhere, Keyshawn Johnson complained that watching the National Championship was like having to eat an undesirable meal to avoid starving.
As for the viewership numbers, the Huskies 2024 title barely did any better than the 2023 Tournament. UConn’s first title of these two, which, again, came at the end of a Cinderella-filled March Madness, was the lowest-viewed men’s championship game with 14.7 million viewers. Last year’s final showdown drew 14.8 million viewers.
And, for what it’s worth, the 2025 NCAA Tournament had the most-watched first day ever, averaging 9.1 million viewers on the opening Thursday. Even if you argue that a good chunk of those fans were tuning in because of upset potential, the numbers also suggest previous “boring” tournaments didn’t keep anyone from coming back next year.
And if this year’s tournament didn’t offer upsets, it did have plenty of talent.
While there have been fewer upsets, eight of Tankathon’s top 10 NBA prospects reached the tournament. Even if some of them didn’t hang around for long, it’s impossible to argue with the star power that has been on display.
Is that everyone’s cup of tea? Apparently not, but it would also be naive to suggest there was a universally bad product hitting the airwaves.
We Could Have a Real (and Complicated) Discussion About Cinderellas
While boringness is ultimately in the eye of the beholder, there is still a relevant discussion to be had regarding NIL (name, image and likeness) money and the transfer portal.
For those who are less familiar with college sports, NIL swung the pendulum back from the previous era when amateurism ruled the land. Now, players are allowed to profit from their image, whether that’s through things like endorsement deals and jersey sales.
That sounds perfectly reasonable—why should schools profit while players miss out?—but combining it with loosened rules around transfers has shaken up the NCAA landscape.
Consider, for example, the St. John’s squad that took the Big East by storm before stumbling in the NCAA Tournament. Their five leading scorers all came to Queens via transfer, and as laid out by Front Office Sports, billionaire St. John’s alum Mike Repole played a key role in the program’s resurgence.
Does this new landscape, where players can change programs to chase better financial packages in bigger markets, make it harder for smaller programs to hold onto the talent required to go on a Cinderella run? Three of this year’s Final Four teams (Duke, Florida and Auburn) did, after all, have former mid-major transfers in their starting five.
At the same time, though, it is worth noting that things can cut both ways. Ole Miss, for example, didn’t fulfill the role of a conventional Cinderella, but they did boast seven transfers on their roster. And St. John’s, the program we just used to demonstrate how NIL can propel a program forward, did fall in one of this year’s most notable upsets.
In fairness, Stephen A. Smith did eventually get to NIL and the transfer portal, even if it was buried beyond the attention-grabbing ‘Death of College Basketball’ headline. Such is the nature of talking-head-based debate show, though; the sound bite is always going to come first.
Dick Vitale, however, shared a similar sentiment when speaking with Newsweek.
“It is very obvious why the favorites are dominating, as it simply relates to the current system that involves the transfer portal and the NIL,” he explained. “With the NIL, the big-time schools are getting all the best players annually from the transfer portal. It is very difficult, for example, for the schools without pockets full of cash to be able to compete on a regular basis against those who have the dollars available. The big money leads to success in recruiting and the rosters of the power conference teams are loaded with multi-talented players.”
And while trying to predict the future is notoriously difficult, especially in sports, the legendary color commentator could see the current on-court trend continuing.
“March Madness will be well received by the fans, as it is such a unique playoff where one bad night and the party is over,” Vitale continued. “Unfortunately, it will be much more difficult for teams like Florida Atlantic, George Mason, University of Massachusetts, etc. to make it to the Final Four. The established teams that have great financial backing year after year most likely will be battling for the National Championship.”
That’s a legitimate and nuanced discussion. Saying that the lack of upsets will kill college basketball, however, is a bit different.
Was It Beautiful or Boring?
So, where does that all leave us in regard to the boringness of this year’s tournament? Back to some eternal truths of the sports world.
Fans just watch sports. This year’s Super Bowl, which people threatened to boycott? It saw record viewing numbers. A boring March Madness tournament? It, at least in the early days, earned more eyeballs than ever before. Nothing is going to make everyone happy but, when push comes to shove, it’s hard to look away from the game we love.
And when you have millions of people tuning in, beauty or boringness is in the eye of the beholder.