The college basketball season is always the high time of the year for sports betting. With 357 NCAA Division I teams, there is no lack of action on any given weekend. Naturally, many have tried to come up with accurate betting systems for college football games. But one of them, which wasn’t actually created as a betting system in the first place, became a favorite and changed college basketball betting forever: the KenPom basketball rankings or Ken Pomeroy rankings.
The KenPom site slowly gained notoriety among college basketball fans. And sure enough, bettors also took notice of KenPom. What was originally a small site compiling statistics from all sorts of college sports, KenPom soon became a reference for sports betting.
But what exactly is the KenPom system? And how exactly can you use KenPom predictions in betting? Are they really that effective? Let’s take a look at what the KenPom system is, how it works in betting, and how to make the best of it to boost your wins. There are a lot of people who swear by KenPom rankings.
The KenPom System Explained
In sports, some people will argue that offense is the best defense. And that does have a logic behind it. After all, the team that dominates actions, such as possession and shooting, leaves as little room as possible for its opponent to fight back. In other words, a good offense can also boost a team’s defensive numbers, even if that same team isn’t as strong from a purely defensive perspective.
But a raw stats sheet doesn’t take that into account. As long as a team produces good numbers on the defensive side of the game, such as giving up fewer points, then it will be considered good on the defense even when that isn’t exactly true. Ken Pomeroy, a meteorologist working for the National Weather Service in Montana, decided that he could come up with a better, more efficient system for college basketball analysis.
In 1999, Pomeroy created the KenPom website, which provided ratings for all sorts of college sports. Five years later, he shifted his site’s focus exclusively to college basketball. In 2012, Pomeroy took the decision to turn KenPom into a full-time operation and quit his job with the National Weather Service.
Back in a time when advanced metrics and stats were very much unheard of, Pomeroy’s approach changed things completely. His system took into account advanced metrics, such as offensive and defensive efficiency (points per 100 possessions), game pace, and strength of schedule, among others.
His system had been growing in notoriety among college basketball fans, sports betting enthusiasts, and even college basketball coaches. The most famous example is current Boston Celtics head coach Brad Stevens. In 2010, when he was Butler head coach, he took the team to its first-ever National Championship Game. Stevens credited KenPom, saying that he would usually check the advanced stats of Butler’s opponents prior to the matches.
Bookmakers, on the other hand, initially weren’t aware of the punters’ best-kept secret. Whenever the betting lines deviated too much due to KenPom predictions, bettors wouldn’t hesitate to take their chances. And more often than not, it resulted in wins.
Naturally, sportsbooks took notice of KenPom. Nowadays, most bookmakers use KenPom as the reference for their own betting lines. As a result, finding lines that differ significantly from KenPom predictions is increasingly difficult. Of course, it doesn’t mean that you can’t use the KenPom rankings for betting, as we will explain further ahead.
Funnily enough, the man himself isn’t an avid punter. In a 2017 interview for ESPN, Pomeroy revealed that he doesn’t even fill the March Madness bracket. KenPom, however, remains a reference among bettors, and even bookmakers keep track of it.
| Rank | Team | Kenpom Rating |
|---|---|---|
| 1 |  Gonzaga | 34.8 |
| 2 |  Auburn | 32.0 |
| 3 |  Kentucky | 31.7 |
| 4 |  Arizona | 30.8 |
| 5 |  Kansas | 30.5 |
Kenpom rankings are based on a variety of factors, including offensive and defensive efficiency, strength of schedule, and recent performance. The rankings are updated daily, and they are a popular tool for college basketball fans and bettors.
Factors Ken Pom Considers When Calculating its Rankings:
- Offensive efficiency: This is a measure of how many points a team scores per 100 possessions.
- Defensive efficiency: This is a measure of how many points a team allows per 100 possessions.
- Strength of schedule: This is a measure of how difficult a team’s schedule has been.
- Recent performance: This is a measure of how well a team has been playing recently.
Kenpom rankings are a valuable tool for college basketball fans and bettors. They can be used to identify teams that are likely to win games, and they can also be used to identify teams that are undervalued by the betting market.
Tips on Using Ken Pom Rankings for Betting
Also learn about How to Understand Betting Scores and Odds
Betting Examples Using the KenPom Basketball Rankings
Pros vs Cons of Using the KenPom System in Betting
🔷 Pros:
🔹 The KenPom system is used as a reference in college basketball by bettors, bookmakers, and coaches. It’s very accurate and offers precise NCAAB predictions most of the time. While finding good odds “hiding in the open” and profiting from huge discrepancies between sportsbook lines and KenPom predictions is a bit hard these days, you can still win consistently by using KenPom as a reference.
🔹 Alternatively, you can always game the KenPom predictions. The Ryno23 system explained above is a good example. While new bettors will usually stick to big games with well-known teams, plenty of matches between less-known programs offer very good payouts.
🔶 Cons:
🔸 The KenPom system has been out in the mainstream for over a decade, and it’s no longer sports betting’s best-kept secret. As much as it remains a reliable tool for punters, big payouts are rarer now.
🔸 As mentioned earlier, KenPom does not take injuries into account. If a team loses a key player before an important match, the KenPom prediction will remain unaltered. For this reason, you shouldn’t trust it blindly.
Summary
The KenPom system changed college basketball betting forever. The fact that nearly two decades later it is still used as a reference by bookmakers, tells just about everything you need to know.
This does come with a downside since punters are no longer able to take advantage of it to win big. But while the payouts aren’t quite as big, you can still safely use the KenPom predictions as a relatively safe reference.
Other bettors have come up with methods to explore it as well, so checking for strategies is always worth it.
FAQs: KenPom Betting System
1. How to use KenPom?
2. How to read KenPom Ratings?
3. What is KenPom Ranking?
4. How is KenPom Calculated?
5. How accurate is KenPom?
