The Vegas Life: March Madness in Sin City

by Bodog Casino | Mar 23 2011

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The biggest betting day of the year in Las Vegas, Nevada isn't just the Super Bowl. Some believe the NFL event has got nothing on the Men's Division I NCAA Basketball Tournament.

With so many wild games going down simultaneously at times, and tons of screens in every Vegas sportsbook on The Strip, it's easy to see why Sin City is the perfect venue to get caught up in March Madness. Jay Rood, the director of race and sports for MGM Resorts International estimates they take in $90 to $100 million in business during the wild tourney.

"We take shifts of two or three people to save the table so we can have a base to work from the whole weekend and it's tiring," said tourney veteran and tourist Frank Bollinger.

"Every hour or so there is a different game so it's like 50 Super Bowls, it's amazing.”

That said, the big schedule didn't necessarily equate to a huge take for Vegas casinos. Thursday's opening day saw the favorites go 7-5-1, which equated to a small win for most, but had the risk from those games heading into Friday's where the books were helped by quite a few upsets as the favorites went 5-11.

The action was massive, but the hold wasn't.

When Saturday's results started getting posted Vegas books saw some big losses as the favorites went 7-1. One of the biggest turnarounds that went the bettors' way was when San Diego State found themselves in a battle with Temple.

One shouldn't feel too sorry for the Vegas books, Sunday did see No. 2 Notre Dame, and No. 3 Purdue go down. We're sure they made a pretty penny on those big upsets.

"The San Diego State game was by far the worst game for our books," said Lucky's Sports Book Director Jimmy Vaccaro, "That game helped a lot of players keep their parlays alive, but when everything was tallied after Sunday's games, we had a good week."

Also, it isn't just the tournament that is making tourism so huge this month in Sin City. St. Patrick's Day and Spring Break are also going down. And, hide your mothers, but Celine Dion is returning to Caesar's Palace. She'll be back for three years.

"To put her with other headlines like Garth Brooks when he is here at the Wynn or Gladys Knight who is going to be opening up in May and then later this fall, Cirque is going to open up the Michael Jackson show and to put those internationally known names in Las Vegas is just fantastic for us. It draws attention, draws a crowd, draws media so it's something that keeps us as the entertainment capital of the world," said Jeremy Handel, Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority.

With Vegas attempting to maintain its place as the world's gaming capitol over China and free online casinos, March Madness gives them two weeks to impress a Super Bowl-sized crowd before things slow down until the new NFL season starts up. Whenever that comes back.

Enjoy March Madness now in the Bodog Sportsbook. And play free casino games at Bodog Casino!