You ready to rake in some cash on March?

What’s the biggest betting event of the year in North America? Not so fast if you guessed the Super Bowl. While the Super Bowl lays claim to being the largest wagered event of the year, March Madness surpasses the NFL’s crown jewel in total wagering volume, probably because the tourney stretches over three weeks.

There is still a little more than a month of college basketball to be played this 2010 NCAA college basketball season before Selection Sunday, but the talk of ”Bubble” teams and tournament seeds is starting to heat up as we hit the most exciting part of the NCAA hoops schedule.

One of the marquee games of every college b-ball schedule, Duke Blue Devils vs. North Carolina Tar Heels, tipped off already. It was the spotlight game for sports bettors as well, as it attracted the most action on the board. The sports betting public scored a solid win as the Tar Heels took it on the chin.

Online sportsbooks had Duke as a -5.5-point favorite, a number they easily covered and with approximately 75 percent of all the betting volume on the Blue Devils, it was a winner for the players. While NC won the NCAA basketball championship last season, they lost power forward Tyler Hansbrough to the NBA and have been a shadow of their former selves this season.

The North Carolina Tar Heels are near the bottom of the…

Will he go in the first round of the draft or will he be the next wasted UNC product like, say, a Sean May?

Yes, the future of Tyler Hansbrough hangs in the balance with going pro in the NBA on the horizon. Can he still be a winner in the pro ranks or will he struggle in the same way like J.J. Reddick has?

Tyler Hansbrough has done it all during his time in North Carolina, diving for loose balls, skinning his knees and elbows and giving up his body to help UNC win it’s 5th national championship.

As the focal point of the North Carolina Tar Heels, Hansbrough has set himself up for the critics. He has been the best player on one of the nation’s highest-profile programs and has performed at an exceptionally high level for four straight years. He’s visible. He’s a player college fans know. He is the kind of player whom coaches love, and so many college basketball fans curiously love to hate. Hansbrough insists he didn’t return to fill the only hole, the glaring absence of national title, on his resume.

One season after winning National Player of the Year honors, Hansbrough continually had to defend his decision to return for his senior year after his NBA stock was at his highest point. He enjoys college and wants his degree, he explained to everyone who asked.

Hansbrough holds some impressive records too. He’s…

If you still feel otherwise, read on.

Helping North Carolina beat Michigan State, 89-72, to win the national title was a dream come true for their trio of superstars; Ty Lawson, Wayne Ellington and Tyler Hansbrough.

After they were surprisingly dumped by Kansas 84-66 in last year’s Final Four, all three almost walked away from the North Carolina Tar Heels basketball program for the glamor of going pro in the NBA.

Ultimately, all three decided to stick it out and try to win a title one more time. It paid off.

”I just wanted to be part of something special,” Tyler Hansbrough, who netted 18 points in the title game, said. ”I’m glad I’m going out like this. I’m glad we’re ending it the right way. I’m just glad we’re going out on the right note.”

The Tar Heels used that loss to Kansas last year as motivation. They started games slowly last year, falling behind quickly and never could recover. Throughout this tournament, rapid-fire starts have been their trademark. North Carolina certainly wasted little time in taking the suspense out of the NCAA final.

It was a fitting end for a team that’s carried the weight of the U.S. college basketball world on their shoulders all year long. From the moment of the first tip this season, all eyes were focused on the Tar Heels. Some pondered whether mighty North Carolina would…

It was a storybook ending for North Carolina.

After becoming the only team outside the Big East to earn one of four no.1 seeds for the tournament, after limping towards the 2009 NCAA Final Four with a hurting point guard and after simply dominating the tournament hosts, the North Carolina Tar Heels are the 2009 NCAA college basketball champions.

How about that huh? In Tyler Hansbrough’s senior year, the North Carolina Tar Heels became the 2009 national champions, sending off the face of their franchise like a hero.

Of course, Tyler Hansbrough could not be denied. And with the help of Wayne Ellington and Ty Lawson, who was playing hurt, the Tar Heels simply destroyed Michigan State, 89-72, in a blowout win that was already over as early as the first half.

”I felt like it was fitting for us to do what this group just accomplished,” UNC coach Roy Williams said.

Hansbrough, playing his last game with the Tar Heels, scored 18 points. Wayne Ellington had 19 while Ty Lawson managed to score a game-high 21 points despite playing hurt.

But the story here is Tyler Hansbrough, a guy who came back for his senior year in North Carolina for…

Bittersweet, that’s the feeling for sports bettors as they head into Final Four weekend.

On one hand, there is sure to be some great basketball served up by the remaining four teams in the 2009 NCAA Final Four, but on the other hand, the college basketball season will crown a champ and turn out the lights for another season in a few days.

The futures betting has been steady on the four remaining teams, with the Connecticut Huskies listed at +250 to win the NCAA national championship, the Michigan State Spartans at +500, the North Carolina Tar Heels the odds-on favorite at -125 and the Villanova Wildcats listed as long shots at +600.

Bettors have been enamored with the North Carolina Tar Heels all tournament, and that hasn’t changed this week. According to SPORTSBETTING.COM, Tyler Hansbrough and crew have received a little over 50 percent of all the wagering volume on the ”who will win the championship” future odds option.

Not surprisingly, the other no.1 seed left standing, that being the Connecticut Huskies, are running second with the sports betting public, grabbing 30 percent of the wagering action.

It all tips-off on Saturday and in the first semifinal…

The final four teams in college basketball will collide this weekend.

The cliché ”time flies when you’re having fun” is an old and dusty one, but it really holds true when it comes to the 2009 March Madness bracket tournament.

It seems like it was only yesterday when it was just Selection Sunday and with a blink of an eye, the opening round, the Sweet 16 and the Elite Eight are all in the rearview mirror and now, the 2009 NCAA Final Four is here.

Last year, there weren’t really any surprises as each of top four seeds; the Memphis Tigers, the North Carolina Tar Heels, the Kansas Jayhawks and the UCLA Bruins all made the Final Four.

While there are two no.1 seeds this year with the North Carolina Tar Heels (again) and the Connecticut Huskies making it, the Michigan State Spartans and the Villanova Wildcats decided to crash the party as well, shocking some college hoops fans in the process.

Of the four, SPORTSBETTING.COM has UNC as the odds-on favorite to win the NCAA championship at -125 followed by the Connecticut Huskies at +250. Michigan State is listed at +500 and Villanova at +600.

Listed as a -7.5 point favorite, North Carolina will try to prevent the Villanova Wildcats from reliving its magical 1985 run (shocked Georgetown), while UConn, favored by 4.5-points, will…

Are you ready?

Michigan State, Connecticut, Villanova and North Carolina are all in the 2009 NCAA Final Four as the Big Dance begins Saturday at Detroit’s Ford Field. This sets up several compelling connections to tournament lore.

Let’s start with the Michigan State Spartans. The Spartans not only get to play 90 miles from its East Lansing campus but returns to the Final Four for the 30th anniversary of its 1979 NCAA title. The famous showdown between Indiana State’s Larry Bird and Michigan State’s Magic Johnson that season helped shaped college basketball.

Detroit is an extension of home. The comforts are a reward for the Big Ten regular season champions, who are 9-0 all-time as a no.2 seed, the same seed Michigan State earned for the 1979 title run. Using stifling defense and Goran Suton’s offense, the Spartans manhandled top overall seed Louisville last Sunday.

Michigan State coach Tom Izzo reached his fifth Final Four, all since 1999, joining the ranks of coaches such as Bob Knight, Lute Olson, Guy Lewis and Rick Pitino. MSU’s 2000 championship is the Big Ten’s most recent national title.

Two teams from the mighty Big East qualified, one shy of the record set by their conference in the 1985 Final Four, as the Connecticut Huskies and the Villanova Wildcats make up half of the Final Four.

No.3 seed Villanova feels a connection to the program’s…

UNC has simply been unbeatable.

Except for the first half of the LSU game in the second round, no team has really challenged North Carolina in the 2009 March Madness bracket tournament.

The Tar Heels even pulled away for a 14-point win over LSU in the second round of their road to the 2009 NCAA Final Four. The biggest worry, however, has been Ty Lawson’s toe injury, but after missing the opener against Radford, he has looked like the point guard who became the ACC (Atlantic Coast Conference) Player of the Year, leading UNC on the brink of winning the national championship.

The North Carolina Tar Heels almost matched their season average of 90 points per game in the tournament, but it was their defense that stood out, especially in the regional final as they held Oklahoma to 60 points, 19 below its average.

UNC head coach Roy Williams is making his third Final Four appearance, and second straight, with North Carolina, having won it all in 2005. He took Kansas to the Final Four four times from 1991-2003, and was an assistant to Dean Smith for several of his trips with North Carolina, including the 1982 national championship.

The Tar Heels will win the national title if they can continue to execute on both ends of the floor. UNC has won by an average margin of 22.5 points against Radford, LSU, Gonzaga and Oklahoma. But if UNC can’t execute the way they did in the first four rounds…

Ty Lawson is starting to feel better, just in time for UNC.

But will he be enough to carry UNC past Gonzaga and advance to the Elite Eight of the 2009 March Madness bracket tournament?

The speedy point guard said his troublesome toe is still achy after returning to the lineup over the weekend, but he plans to play against Gonzaga this Friday when his North Carolina Tar Heels resume their campaign in these bracket battles.

Will he be at 100 percent? For what it’s worth, Ty Lawson is optimistic about it and UNC coach Roy Williams is too, that the ACC (Atlantic Coast Conference) Player of the Year will be ready for the NCAA tournament’s round of 16.

Lawson had missed three straight games with a jammed right big toe before helping the top-seeded Tar Heels (30-4) rally past LSU in Saturday’s second-round game in the South Regional. He experienced some minor swelling afterwards, but thankfully, it was nothing like what followed the regular-season finale against Duke.

He participated in the team’s shootaround Monday and went through some drills during practice this week. But the team has been cautious, keeping him out of practice for almost two weeks, in addition to missing both of the…

If you’re in for the dramatic, I can’t blame you for taking UNC.

After all, aside from the fact that North Carolina is the ONLY no.1 seeded team not coming out of the Big East, the Tar Heels are coming in the 2009 March Madness bracket tournament looking to win the national title in Tyler Hansbrough’s last hurrah. Hansbrough has been the face of UNC the last four years and it is only fitting for them to go and win the big one in Hansbrough’s senior year.

But will North Carolina be a good bandwagon to ride on to win a lot of dough until the end of the tournament? Sure, they have Tyler Hansbrough and Ty Lawson but can these guys be enough for UNC to end up with the national title?

No.1 has been a tenuous position atop the polls all year and the North Carolina Tar Heels demonstrated this again last week, when they were dumped by the Florida State Seminoles in the ACC semi-finals. They were beat 73-70, failing to cover as 8.5-point favorites.

While the Tar Heels were hot down the stretch going 16-4 straight up in their last 20 games, they were far from profitable for their backers, as they limped to a 7-13 mark against the spread.

Bettors actually made out okay in the tilt between UNC and Florida State, as the No.1 team in the nation was only…