This season, women’s college basketball became a sports fixture, gaining massive viewership and widespread cultural importance, propelling the sport to new heights in the betting market. Several prominent sportsbooks, including ESPN BET, Caesars, BetMGM, Draft Kings, and FanDuel, confirmed that Sunday’s NCAA championship game between Iowa and South Carolina was the most-bet women’s college basketball game ever. The latter three sites also confirmed that it was the most-bet women’s sporting event in their history.
The game, in which the Gamecocks avenged their 2023 Final Four defeat to the Hawkeyes, took over the record from this year’s Final Four contest between UConn and Iowa, which broke the mark established by LSU-Iowa in the Elite Eight. According to Ben Fawkes, the Gamecock’s victory against the Hawkeyes resulted in a huge 205% spike in bets on FanDuel sportsbooks compared to last year’s title game.
The tournament has become the largest Basketball betting event in women’s sports history on FanDuel. In comparison to the previous season’s national championship between Iowa and LSU, total money gambled on championship games increased by 155 percent.
There were a lot of bets against the spread (ATS) for Sunday’s game, which South Carolina won 87-75. South Carolina took home 63 percent of the ATS wagers at BetMGM Sportsbook, where the Gamecocks’ spread increased from 5.5 to 6.5 by kickoff.
They would go on to cover the spread, but Caitlin Clark’s Hawkeyes were generating so much public interest that bookmakers were pounding the futures market and moneyline for Iowa to win the national championship.
Iowa began at +200 on the money line and ended around +220 on BetMGM, despite the Hawkeyes receiving 87 percent of bets and 73% of the outright handle before tipoff.
South Carolina’s victory was a solid one for BetMGM, but an Iowa cover would have made it even better. “Bettors are backing Caitlin Clark and Iowa to upset South Carolina in the National Championship game,” said Matt Cosgriff, Director of Trading at BetMGM, before the event.
The Iowa-UConn game shattered the previous round’s record, with the Iowa-LSU game in the Elite Eight drawing an average of 12.3 million viewers.
According to ESPN, the game between Clark and unbeaten South Carolina on Sunday was the most-watched athletic event since 2019, outside from football and the Olympics. It was also the highest-rated basketball game at any level since 2019.
Furthermore, the South Carolina-Iowa game became the second most-watched non-Olympic athletic event ever on American television, trailing only the 2015 women’s World Cup Final, in which the United States defeated Japan 5-2.
