March Madness Betting & Bonuses in NJ

With more sportsbooks in the New Jersey market and total sports betting handle on the rise, March Madness numbers should soar once again in 2025. Due to NJ regulations, you can’t bet on NJ-based college teams or games played in NJ. New Jersey will play host to Sweet 16 and Elight Eight matchups inside the Prudential Center, but outside of those matchups, residents will be able to bet on most teams in the Big Dance.

You can play all the March Madness bracket contests, bet on NCAA basketball futures, or bet live on each March Madness game in progress as long as no NJ teams are involved or any games are taking place within the state. Here’s how to bet on March Madness in NJ. Find the best March Madness odds boosts & promos below.

Best NJ online sportsbooks for March Madness

 

March Madness brackets

March Madness bracket contests and pools are the way most Americans have fun regarding the NCAA tournament. It involves filling out a full bracket and picking winners for every one of the 67 games in the NCAA Tournament before it begins. There are also Second-Chance bracket contests allowing you to enter new brackets for later tournament rounds.

Brackets are quite different from game-by-game betting on the NCAA Tournament. The latter allows you to be more selective in the teams you back and pay out based on posted odds rather than your standing against others. With brackets, you either pay to enter your selections in a pool at the office, local bar, social club, or sportsbook, or submit it to a free-to-enter NCAA Tournament bracket contest.

Plenty of New Jersey sportsbooks offer March Madness bracket challenges that give players the chance to win some serious cash and big prizes.

Top 5 tips for picking your March Madness bracket

The unpredictability of bracket betting aside, there’s no doubt it’s one of the most fun ways to bet on March Madness. Whether this is your first bracket or your 100th, the following five basic March Madness bracket-building tips tend to hold true:

1. Trust the odds

NJ online sportsbooks post futures odds for every team and moneyline point spread lines for (virtually) every game. This information can actually give you some help in filling out a bracket.

The lines are posted by oddsmakers with in-depth knowledge about the world of college basketball betting betting, and you can lean on these NCAA experts to help you make your picks.

They aren’t always right, but they’re not often way wrong. You can feel confident in using the information available at NJ sports betting apps to help you make the majority of your March Madness picks.

Just look for the teams that oddsmakers have as massive first-round favorites, or favorites to win it all, then pencil them into the second or third round at the very least.

2. Trust the seeding early

Before 2018, no top seed had ever lost to a No. 16 seed in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. The Maryland-Baltimore County win over Virginia in 2018 broke a 135-game winning streak for No. 1 seeds and proved March Madness miracles can happen. Then in 2023, 16-seed Fairleigh Dickinson toppled 1-seed Purdue.

These two wins stirred up plenty of excitement of cinderallas. However, it also highlighted how rare those miracles are.

The truth is the top four seeds almost always win in the first two rounds of the NCAA Tournament. The top four seeds have lost just twice in the history of the tourament.

You never want to ignore this when filling out our March Madness brackets.

3. Look out for the No. 12 seed

The No. 5 vs. No. 12 first round match up has proven to be a bit of a statistical anomaly in the NCAA Tournament. No. 12 seeds actually win more than statistically expected in these games. There have been 55 12 seed over 5 seed upsets since the NCAA tournament field expanded in 1985. Out of those total games, that puts the #12 seed win rate at 35.3%.

The No. 10 and No. 11 seeds often fill Cinderella’s glass slipper in the early rounds as well.

Part of filling out a winning bracket is picking upsets. You can’t just pick the higher seed to win all the way through and expect to win a contest or pool. The trick is to find the real opportunities for big upsets, and the No. 12, No. 11, and No. 10 seeds are often a good place to start.

4. Heat check

Look for lower-seeded teams that have truly played their way into the NCAA Tournament by upsetting a perennial favorite to win a conference tournament title.

Momentum is real in the NCAA Tournament, so look for hot teams that are playing above their heads to continue to win through the early rounds of the tournament at least.

5. Trust the seeding late

Historically, the higher-seeded team wins almost 75% of the time in the Final Four.

When it comes time to fill out the last few games in your bracket, take a look back at the seeding to give you an idea of who the real favorites are.

March Madness Game-by-game betting

NJ online sportsbooks offer individual bets on most of the NCAA Tournament action. Again, the only limits New Jersey residents have is the inability to bet on in-state programs or games that take place within state lines.

The main advantage of betting March Madness game-by-game is the freedom it provides.

Filling out a 67-game bracket requires you to pick a winner in every single game – before you even know if a team will advance beyond the first round. Betting March Madness game-by-game allows you to be much more selective and avoid betting games where you simply don’t have all the information you need.

Brackets get busted early and futures fizzle out. But combine game-by-game betting with proper bankroll management principles and you can find a way to carry your balance through the length of the NCAA Tournament.

There’s nothing wrong with entering several free and low-entry bracket contests. It’s just that it’s a lot harder to win a bracket contest than a single-game wager. Therefore, wagering a sizable portion of your bankroll on bracket contests is a bad idea.

You’re much better off doing some NCAA basketball research and applying proper bankroll management principles to game-by-game March Madness betting.

That research should start with the NCAA Tournament seeding. Just like the odds NJ online and mobile sportsbooks post on NCAA games can provide some help in filling out a bracket, the seeding can give some insight into March Madness game betting. Plus, some of the same strategies you apply to filling out a bracket can help you identify the best NCAA Tournament bets.

March Madness betting lines

The NCAA Tournament and each game that is a part of it offers a wide variety of betting opportunities. That’s a big part of the reason why more money is bet on this event than any other in US sports, college or pro.

Here is a rundown of the different March Madness betting lines:

Moneyline

For those unfamiliar with sports betting terms, the moneyline bet comes down to picking the straight-up winner.

There is a number, or odds, associated with each team. If Harvard is listed at -600 against Columbia, they’re considered a heavy favorite (you would need to bet $600 to win $100).

On the flip-side, if Columbia, +440, were to win, that same $100 wager would net the bettor $440. The plus sign before the number means the team is an underdog.

Point spread

Once the NCAA Tournament field is set, point spreads will be released for the first round of 32 games. Several of the games, including the No. 1 versus No. 16 matchups, will feature double-digit spreads.

But which side will cover the spread?

Betting on the favorite means your pick needs to win by a margin determined by the odds. Betting on the underdog gives the bettor a cushion in which a team loss may still produce a winning ticket.

Total points

No real explanation is needed. NJ sportsbooks set an over/under line, or total points, for each game. The bettor simply decides which side of the line to play.

Parlay

Parlays bring an added challenge to the sports betting game as they can range from two legs to 10-plus.

Each leg of the bet is dependent on the other to produce a winning ticket. However, there are times where one of the legs ends in a tie. If that happens, the bettor will still receive a payout at reduced odds.

Teasers

Teaser bets are a way to reduce the betting line, either reducing points on the favorite or adding them to the underdog. These wagers apply to two or more teams.

Some sites also offer Teaser+, courtesy of Kambi. Unibet and SugarHouse use Kambi to power their sportsbooks. You can read more about Teaser+ here.

Prop bets

Prop bets are the more outside-the-box wagers. Player and team props (short for propositions) are offered for most sports. A certain player scoring 20 points or more or which team will score the first basket of the game are a couple of examples.

March Madness player & game props

NJ sportsbooks will make a variety of game and player prop bets available for NCAA games. The number of props available will also increase the closer to the Championship game it is.

Props are bets on the games within the game and on players achieving various statistical milestones.

Props vary but you can expect to see game props like an over/under on the largest lead by either, the total 3-point field goals by both teams, and moneyline odds on the team to make first 3-point shot.

You can also expect to see player props including an over/under on a specific player’s points, free throws made, and rebounds.

New Jersey is one of just six regulated sports betting markets to allow college player prop wagering. Just remember that you can’t place prop bets, along with any other wagers, on New Jersey college teams or games that take place inside the state.

How does Selection Sunday work?

There are 68 teams in the NCAA Tournament. The field is made up of 31 teams that earn automatic bids by winning their respective conference tournaments. The other 37 teams are given at-large bids on Selection Sunday, which falls on March 12 this year.

The NCAA Selection Committee is uses a system called NET to select the 37 teams at-large bids.

The NCAA Evaluation Tool (NET) relies on data to rank teams from across the country and the NCAA Selection Committee gives the top 37 ranking non-conference tournament winners the at-large bids. The data includes:

• Game results
• Strength of schedule
• Game location
• Scoring margin
• Net offensive and defensive efficiency,
• Quality of wins and losses

The NCAA then ranks all 68 teams and the eight lowest teams face off in the First Four games on March 18 and 19. The winners advance to the first round. First and second-round games will take place on March 20-23, 2025.

March Madness in NJ

NJ Sportsbooks are forbidden by law to take bets on college basketball games in New Jersey or involving NJ-based schools. That means if an NJ team makes the NCAA Tournament its games are off the board and removed from all brackets. You simply cannot bet on these games or these teams in NJ.

There are seven NJ colleges and universities that have NCAA Division I men’s basketball programs, including:

• NJIT Highlanders: New Jersey Institute of Technology NJIT (Newark, NJ)
• Princeton Tigers: Princeton University (Princeton, NJ)
• Rutgers Scarlet Knights: Rutgers University (New Brunswick, NJ)
• Monmouth Hawks: Monmouth University (West Long Branch, NJ)
• Rider Broncs: Rider University ( Lawrenceville, NJ)
• Fairleigh Dickinson Knights: Fairleigh Dickinson University (Madison, NJ)
• Saint Peter’s Peacocks: Saint Peter’s University (Jersey City, NJ)
• Seton Hall Pirates: Seton Hall University (South Orange, NJ)

Additionally, you can’t bet on March Madness games that take place in New Jersey. This year, Sweet 16 and Elite Eight games will take place in Newark, New Jersey, for the East Regional. These games take place between March 27 and 29. So, New Jersey residents will be able to wager on all Sweet 16 and Elite Eight contests outside of those taking place in the Prudential Center.

Where can I bet on March Madness in New Jersey?

All nine Atlantic City casinos have retail sportsbooks up and running.

Freehold Raceway, Monmouth Park and the Meadowlands Racetrack each have a sportsbook, too. Those watching the games from home, and as long as you are in NJ, can place their bets using one of the top NJ sportsbook apps.

Why bet March Madness online?

There are several reasons why more than 80% of the sports bets in New Jersey are placed online. It starts with convenience and the fact NJ sports betting apps are open 24/7 and available from anywhere inside the state. But it doesn’t end there.

The choice you have between several operators means you can line shop from your couch to find the best prices on a bet. There’s no waiting in line, no identifying numbers and no special betting jargon required to place bets.

Online and mobile sports betting gives you the chance to make the bets you want instantly from a phone, tablet, or computer. March Madness also offers 67 games over three weeks with literally thousands of in-game betting opportunities. As mentioned, if you’re from out of state you can also download and manage your account from home and simply hop across the state line to bet.

Ultimately, no missed opportunities and no lineup help make the choice between traditional retail sportsbooks and betting apps a no brainer.

NJ online sportsbooks

Online Sportsbook	Land-Based Affiliate	Available Bonus
Caesars Sportsbook NJ	Caesars AC	Bet $1, Double Your Winnings on Next 10 Wagers
Bet365 Sportsbook NJ	Hard Rock AC	First Bet Safety Net up to $1,000 or Bet $5 Get $150 in Bonus Bets
BetMGM Sportsbook NJ	Borgata AC	Up to $1,500 in Bonus Bets if Your First Bet Doesn’t Win*
FanDuel Sportsbook NJ	Meadowlands	Bet $5, Get $150 in Bonus Bets if Your Bet Wins
Fanatics Sportsbook NJ	Ocean Casino Resort	Bet and Get up to $1,000 in No Sweat Bets
BetRivers Sportsbook NJ	Monmouth Park	2nd Chance Bet up to $250
Hard Rock Bet Sportsbook NJ	Hard Rock AC	Bet $5, Get $150 in Bonus Bets
DraftKings Sportsbook NJ	Resorts AC	Up to $1,200 in Bonuses

*Bonus Bets Expire in 7 Days. One New Customer Offer Only. Add’l terms.

NJ sportsbook locations

Casino/racetrack	Sportsbook	Open?
Borgata	BetMGM Sportsbook & Bar/BetMGM Race & Sportsbook	Yes
Resorts	DraftKings Sportsbook at Resorts	Yes
Ocean Resort	The Gallery Bar, Book & Games @ Ocean Resort	Yes
Monmouth Park	Monmouth Park Sports Book by Caesars	Yes
Meadowlands	FanDuel Sportsbook	Yes
Harrah's	Caesars Sportsbook at Harrah's Resort	Yes
Hard Rock	Hard Rock Sportsbook	Yes
Golden Nugget	The Sportsbook	Yes
Bally's	FanDuel Sportsbook at Bally's	Yes
Tropicana	Caesars Sportsbook at Tropicana Atlantic City	Yes
Caesars	Caesars Sportsbook at Wild Wild West	Yes
Freehold Raceway	Parx Sportsbook at Freehold Raceway	Yes

Get prepped for March Madness betting in New Jersey

As we get closer and closer to Selection Sunday, it’s a good reminder to keep up to date on all things college basketball. Pay close attention to how teams fare in their conference tournaments and which teams appear to be clicking at the right time. That way, you will be all ready for March Madness betting in New Jersey when the field is finalized.