On Thursday afternoon, the NCAA announced that the 2020 NCAA Tournament will be canceled due to concerns surrounding the spread of the Coronavirus COVID-19.
This leaves plenty of questions in the gambling space, including what happens to pending college basketball future bets in the wake of the Coronavirus.
Will they be refunded? And if so, what about teams that had no chance of actually making the NCAA Tournament field?
According to Jeff Sherman, SuperBook USA’s VP of Risk Management, his sportsbook will be refunding all bets on the 2020 college basketball national championship.
This not only covers those expected to qualify for the 68-team field, but any title wager placed on any Division I program.
FanDuel Sportsbook is taking a similar approach:
With the college basketball season now over, sportsbooks clearly had the ability to refund all wagers, which is different from how they’re handling NBA bets.
For example, the Westgate SuperBook requires all 82 games to be played for action, meaning an incomplete regular season would void and refund all wagers.
On the other hand, PointsBet clarified that win total over bets that had already been confirmed will be paid out, while all other bets will be refunded, according to Director of Communications Patrick Eichner.
Will Conference Tournament Futures Be Refunded?
Books will likely refund all conference tournament futures in which a winner was not declared, even if the team you bet was eliminated, but check with your book to make sure.
What About Win Totals?
College basketball win totals are a new market, but every book I saw offering them were regular season only. So this bet should have already been settled.
