While VCU has established itself as this year's ultimate NCAA tournament Cinderella story and gained lots of support from casual fans around the country, Las Vegas sports books are hoping that the Rams' run ends short of a national title.
"VCU is the one team that we don't want to win it," said Mike Colbert, the race and sports director for Cantor Gaming, which runs four Las Vegas sports books, including the M Resort.
Why not the Rams? Well, it's because of future bets put in on VCU after the NCAA tournament's first weekend.
To start the year, the Cantor books had VCU as a member of "the field" among their list of teams to bet to win it all. That drew little action. It remained in "the field" entering the tournament, but once it upset Purdue and advanced to the Sweet 16, it couldn't be hidden anymore.
"We listed VCU at 100-to-1 ? the lowest-rated team of the 16," Colbert said. "I remember vividly posting them and Richmond, who was 80-to-1. We took some pretty significant bets at that point. We do have risk on VCU, but other than that, we're in really good shape."
Even if VCU pulls off the slight upset of Butler on Saturday night in Houston, the books might not take as big of a hit as anticipated, as plenty of money will likely come in against them should they advance to Monday's title game.
According to the money coming in, picking a winner in that one is tough enough.
"I can tell you that that game so far has been bet pretty evenly," Colbert said. "We've taken some big bets on both sides. We actually have a little more money on Butler, but nothing significant. VCU has really drawn some backers here. We're getting mostly money line bets on VCU and point spread bets on Butler."
Those betting Butler are laying 2.5 points, as that number has remained pretty solid throughout the week. Colbert said that he doesn't anticipate much movement, and if it does, it likely won't creep any higher than three points in the Bulldogs' favor.
As for the money line bets on VCU (picking the Rams to win straight-up), the current number is +125 across town (bet $1 to win $1.25).
While Butler and VCU have drawn much of the national attention this week in the media, Colbert said that he expects his books to pull in more bets on the UConn-Kentucky game.
"Twice as much ? I'm seeing that already," he said. "As we get closer to the games, the bets will get bigger."
He added that most of the money early came in on UConn as a 2.5-point underdog, but once the line dropped down to two points, UK began seeing heavier action, and that line will likely float between two and 2.5�until tip.
The most intriguing bet in that game, it appears, is the prop play on UConn star Kemba Walker's total points for the night.
Colbert said that props on Walker have been popular plays throughout the tournament.
The over/under for Walker's point total in the Sweet 16 against San Diego State was set at 22.5 points (he scored 36), then bumped up to 25.5 against Arizona in the Elite Eight (he scored 20).
It's remaining at 25.5 for Saturday night. For reference, in a Nov. 24 blowout of Kentucky in Maui, Walker tallied 29. But this is a much different UK team than it was four months ago, adding another level of intrigue to the 2011 Final Four.
"I don't think the interest is any more or any less," Colbert said. "I think it's a pretty ordinary Final Four. I think the UK-UConn game is as good as anything you can find."
Ryan Greene also covers UNLV and the Mountain West Conference for the Las Vegas Sun. Read his Rebels coverage and follow him on Twitter.
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