Updated Men's 2026 Championship Odds Going into Final Four

With just three games remaining until the 2026 men's national champion is crowned, Arizona, Connecticut, Illinois and Michigan will converge upon the Final Four in Indianapolis to duke it out.

Who cuts down those final sets of nets, though?

Our national championship odds for each of the remaining four teams are based on a combination of how good each squad was during the regular season, how it has looked through four NCAA tourney games and how difficult its remaining path is.

Obviously, all of the remaining paths are brutal, as all four of these teams rank in the top 10 on KenPom. However, if you had to bet your house on either the Arizona/Michigan winner or the Connecticut/Illinois winner going on to win the title, you're most likely picking the former, right?

Teams are listed in ascending order of likelihood to win the title. Our odds sum to 100 percent and are not intended to reflect actual betting lines in Vegas, which even at this stage of the tournament typically sum to around 115 percent.

Connecticut Huskies

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Tarris Reed Jr.

How They Got Here:

82-71 vs. No. 15 Furman
73-57 vs. No. 7 UCLA
67-63 vs. No. 3 Michigan State
73-72 vs. No. 1 Duke

While three-fourths of the teams in the Final Four more or less cruised through their first four games, Connecticut had more than enough drama to spare. The opener against Furman was pretty close until the last couple of minutes. UCLA gave the Huskies a battle, even without Tyler Bilodeau. The final margin was 16, but that was a four-point game with six minutes to go. And then holy big swings in Washington D.C., blowing a 19-point lead against Michigan State before scratching out a win, followed by UConn erasing a 19-point deficit against Duke to win essentially at the buzzer.

Star of the Show: Tarris Reed Jr. (21.8 PPG, 13.5 RPG, 3.0 APG, 2.3 BPG, 1.0 SPG)

Alex Karaban is the Connecticut legend, but the Huskies would've been gone a long time ago were it not for Reed. He carried them with 31 points and 27 rebounds against Furman. He stabilized them with a combined 30 points and 18 rebounds across the next two games. And then he was their rock against the Blue Devils, keeping them just barely alive for long enough to mount the comeback.

Reason to Buy: It's Connecticut

By all current-season accounts, this is the least impressive team left in the field. UConn has been hovering around 10th on KenPom pretty much all season long, but they're nowhere close to Michigan, Arizona and Illinois in terms of overall efficiency. It's Dan Hurley, though. And Alex Karaban. They're inevitable. And the only team in the past four years to vanquish this NCAA Tournament behemoth was last year's eventual national champion, Florida, in a second-round game that was close throughout. Good luck slaying this dragon.

Reason to Sell: Fouls and turnovers

At this stage of the tournament, the little things get magnified. And though UConn did a sensational job in the turnovers department against Duke, the combination of occasionally sloppy ball-handling and ranking outside the top 300 nationally in free-throw rate on both ends of the floor could be their undoing in Indianapolis. Maybe not against Illinois, who ranks dead last in the nation in forcing turnovers. They also don't draw many fouls. But probably in the championship game.

Title Odds: +500

Illinois Fighting Illini

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Keaton Wagler

How They Got Here:

105-70 vs. No. 14 Penn
76-55 vs. No. 11 VCU
65-55 vs. No. 2 Houston
71-59 vs. No. 9 Iowa

Save for falling behind 12-2 early in the Elite Eight game against Iowa, Illinois has made this tournament look almost too easy. The Penn game was over in a hurry. And though both VCU and Houston hung around for a while, a 24-4 run in the former and a 20-2 run in the latter was a vivid reminder of how quickly things can unravel when facing the Illini.

Star of the Show: Keaton Wagler (17.5 PPG, 6.5 RPG, 3.8 APG, 1.0 BPG, 1.0 SPG, 11-25 3PT)

By now, you've surely heard Wagler's rags to riches story of sorts. Overlooked. Under-recruited. A 3-star recruit ranked 261st in the 2025 class by the 247 Sports composite. (If '261' with three stars isn't tattooed somewhere on his body, it should be soon.) He thought he might even need to redshirt, but ended up starting from Day One. And now he is the sine qua non who has anchored Illinois' first Final Four run since 2005.

Reason to Buy: Relentless Offense

Wagler is the most consistent individual star, but Illinois has the most efficient offense in the nation because everyone in the primary eight-man rotation can shoot from distance, everyone crashes the offensive glass, no one struggles with turnovers and anyone can be "the guy" on any given night. They had two of their lowest scoring games of the season in the Sweet 16 and Elite Eight, but they could go off for 90 against just about anyone.

Reason to Sell: Will the defense keep this up?

In getting immediately eliminated from the Big Ten tournament, Illinois allowed 91 points to Wisconsin. It was the fifth time in their final nine games leading into the dance that the Illini gave up at least 84 points in a loss. So, color us surprised that they've held their last three foes below 60 points, even if we're talking about a team that lost its starting point guard to an injury one minute into the game (VCU) and two of the slowest-paced teams in the entire country (Houston and Iowa). Can they continue to dominate on that end of the floor?

Title Odds: +400

Michigan Wolverines

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Yaxel Lendeborg

How They Got Here:

101-80 vs. No. 16 Howard
95-72 vs. No. 9 Saint Louis
90-77 vs. No. 4 Alabama
95-62 vs. No. 6 Tennessee

The Michigan team that struggled to score in the first half of March? Nowhere to be found thus far in the tournament, averaging 95.3 points while pretty much destroying everything in its path—reminiscent of that stretch from mid-November through early January when a 40-0 national championship felt like a real possibility.

Star of the Show: Yaxel Lendeborg (21.0 PPG, 7.3 RPG, 4.3 APG, 11-22 3PT)

Lendeborg took it easy in Michigan's tournament opener, scoring just nine points on five shots. Since then, however, he has resumed his usual role as the Wolverines' most dominant force, averaging 25.0 points over the past three games. They don't always need this first-team All-American carrying the load, but they can be scary good when he does.

Reason to Buy: Sheer athleticism

Whether you want to call it big speed or fast height, Michigan is unique in its ability to play the best defense in the nation and then run a fast break where a 6'9" Lendeborg Eurosteps his way into an alley-oop to 7'3" Aday Mara, with 6'9" Morez Johnson Jr. right there as an elite offensive rebounder, if needed. And when this freight train gets rolling down the track, Godspeed to anything in its path.

Reason to Sell: Turnover margin

Saint Louis, Alabama and Tennessee weren't even remotely able to make the Wolverines pay for it, but they've posted a negative turnover margin in each of their last three games and now sit at a minus-43 differential in that department over their past 13 games. Sloppiness with the ball isn't the problem so much as the fact that they haven't forced more than 12 turnovers in a game since Jan. 2. Regardless, that could be a game-changing factor now that it's nothing but great opponents left on the schedule.

Title Odds: +220

Arizona Wildcats

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How They Got Here:

92-58 vs. No. 16 Long Island
78-66 vs. No. 9 Utah State
109-88 vs. No. 4 Arkansas
79-64 vs. No. 2 Purdue

The first half against Purdue was a bit surprising, and Utah State kept things interesting longer than most expected. But Arizona has pretty well cruised to four consecutive wins by double digits, not trailing for a second of the first three games before ultimately running away with the fourth game, too. Per usual, rebounds have been a major piece of the puzzle, averaging a +14.5 margin thus far in the tournament.

Star of the Show: Brayden Burries (17.8 PPG, 6.3 RPG, 2.0 APG, 13-19 3PT)

It's funny to look back now at Burries' early-season production. Three points in the season opener against Florida? Five against UCLA and four at Connecticut later in November? How did the Wildcats win those games while getting virtually nothing from what has become their biggest star? He has been shooting the lights out lately, including three big triples in that second half against the Boilermakers.

Reason to Buy: Wagon-like tendencies

Even in a loaded Final Four field, Arizona is one of those teams like 2023-24 Connecticut, 2017-18 Villanova or 2011-12 Kentucky that can beat you in so many different ways that it felt inevitable the Wildcats would at least make it this far. And while the impending clash with Michigan has all of the juice, Arizona's frontcourt can more than go toe-to-toe with the Wolverines' bigs, while Burries and Jaden Bradley could outclass Elliot Cadeau and Co.

Reason to Sell: Three-point shooting

We all know Arizona doesn't shoot many three-pointers, but going 1-for-6 from distance in the first half against Purdue was a major factor in that early deficit—while going 4-for-9 after the intermission helped spark the rally-turned-rout. Burries has been red hot thus far, but the rest of the Wildcats have gone a combined 10-for-34 (29.4 percent) from distance. So if Burries goes cold, that could spell disaster.

Title Odds: +210