March Madness is nearing a fever pitch as we’re nearly done with all the Sweet Sixteen games in the NCAA men’s and women’s basketball tournament. Both brackets are getting close to the Elite Eight, and my own tournament picks are doing surprisingly well.
I’m actually tied for first place.
That’s because I didn’t pick them myself. AI did, and wouldn’t you know, it went 28 for 32 in the first round and 14 for 16 in the second round. You can see all the results below.
I don’t know much at all about the teams playing in this year’s NCAA men’s basketball tournament (or women’s), but I’m still trying to win my bracket pool. It’s a bit embarrassing because I went to UCLA and attended many college basketball games. I also follow the NBA obsessively (go, Lakers!), but I’ve been totally out of it when it comes to college basketball this year.
Nevertheless, I signed up for a March Madness bracket pool, and naturally, I don’t want to lose. I don’t think I’ll win first place, but there are some pretty decent prizes for the Top 5, which seems attainable. I’m confident, not because I’m a lucky guy, but because I used an AI chatbot, more specifically ChatGPT, to create my bracket for me.
I don’t expect perfection — in fact, no one has ever had a perfect bracket in the history of the NCAA March Madness men’s basketball tournament. The odds of a perfect bracket are 1 in 9.2 quintillion. But I don’t need perfection. I just need to do better than my friends, co-workers, family members and everyone else in my pool.
So why not use ChatGPT?
How I asked ChatGPT to fill out my March Madness bracket
There are many ways to ask ChatGPT to fill out a March Madness bracket. Here are a few different scenarios that could have worked, plus the eventual option that I chose.
You can play it safe and stick to mostly favorites.
«Fill out my March Madness bracket with a statistically sound and low-risk approach, prioritizing favorites while including a few historically reasonable upsets.»
You can also go a little riskier in case you think that there might be more upsets than usual.
«Fill out my March Madness bracket with a mix of strong favorites, a few calculated upsets and at least one dark horse team making a deep run.»
You can also go really high risk, which might lead to high reward (but most likely not).
«Fill out my March Madness bracket with a bold, upset-heavy approach — prioritizing big Cinderella runs, major early round upsets and at least one surprise Final Four team.»
Now that’s bold!
Whatever prompt you use, you can tweak it as you see fit. You’ll probably be asked follow-up questions anyway, which you can answer to get a more tailored bracket. You can go with strong analytics-based picks or include hot teams with momentum. You can choose historically proven upset trends or go with gut-feeling wild card teams. And there’s always a Cinderella team, so you can push ChatGPT to include one.
These are all questions that ChatGPT may ask you in subsequent responses, so choose wisely.
I personally didn’t want to go too risky with my NCAA bracket, so I opted for a medium-risk prompt.
Here’s the NCAA bracket that ChatGPT chose for me
Using the prompt «Fill out a complete March Madness bracket for me, with a mix of strong favorites, a few calculated upsets and at least one dark horse team making a deep run. Make sure to include the First Four. Use this as a guide: https://www.ncaa.com/march-madness-live/bracket,» this is the bracket that ChatGPT (version ChatGPT 4o) generated for me:
Note: ChatGPT initially wasn’t giving me the correct teams, so I had to tell it to use the official NCAA website with the bracket on it as a guide. And I also had to mention to include the First Four teams, which it kept missing. Depending on what version of ChatGPT you’re using, you may have to play around with your prompt to get a correct answer.
Here’s the complete 2025 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament bracket with the First Four, strong favorites, calculated upsets, and a dark horse making a deep run. I’ve also added in whether ChatGPT correctly picked the winner in the first 52 games that have been played so far.
First Four
(16) Alabama State defeats (16) Saint Francis (PA) ✅
(16) Mount St. Mary’s defeats (16) American ✅
(11) North Carolina defeats (11) San Diego State ✅
(11) Texas defeats (11) Xavier ❌
South Region
First Round
(1) Auburn defeats (16) Alabama State ✅
(8) Louisville defeats (9) Creighton ❌
(5) Michigan defeats (12) UC San Diego ✅
(4) Texas A&M defeats (13) Yale ✅
(6) Ole Miss defeats (11) North Carolina ✅
(3) Iowa State defeats (14) Lipscomb ✅
(7) Marquette defeats (10) New Mexico ❌
(2) Michigan State defeats (15) Bryant ✅
Second Round
(1) Auburn defeats (8) Louisville Creighton ✅
(5) Michigan defeats (4) Texas A&M ✅
(3) Iowa State defeats (6) Ole Miss ❌
(2) Michigan State defeats (7) Marquette New Mexico ✅
Sweet 16
(1) Auburn defeats (5) Michigan
(2) Michigan State defeats (3) Iowa State
Elite 8
(1) Auburn defeats (2) Michigan State
East Region
First Round
(1) Duke defeats (16) Mount St. Mary’s ✅
(8) Mississippi State defeats (9) Baylor ❌
(5) Oregon defeats (12) Liberty ✅
(4) Arizona defeats (13) Akron ✅
(6) BYU defeats (11) VCU ✅
(3) Wisconsin defeats (14) Montana ✅
(7) Saint Mary’s defeats (10) Vanderbilt ✅
(2) Alabama defeats (15) Robert Morris ✅
Second Round
(1) Duke defeats (8) Mississippi State Baylor ✅
(4) Arizona defeats (5) Oregon ✅
(3) Wisconsin defeats (6) BYU ❌
(2) Alabama defeats (7) Saint Mary’s ✅
Sweet 16
(1) Duke defeats (4) Arizona
(2) Alabama defeats (3) Wisconsin
Elite 8
(1) Duke defeats (2) Alabama
Midwest Region
First Round
(1) Houston defeats (16) SIU Edwardsville ✅
(8) Gonzaga defeats (9) Georgia ✅
(5) Clemson defeats (12) McNeese ❌
(4) Purdue defeats (13) High Point ✅
(6) Illinois defeats (11) Texas ✅
(3) Kentucky defeats (14) Troy ✅
(7) UCLA defeats (10) Utah State ✅
(2) Tennessee defeats (15) Wofford ✅
Second Round
(1) Houston defeats (8) Gonzaga ✅
(4) Purdue defeats (5) Clemson McNeese ✅
(3) Kentucky defeats (6) Illinois ✅
(2) Tennessee defeats (7) UCLA ✅
Sweet 16
(1) Houston defeats (4) Purdue
(2) Tennessee defeats (3) Kentucky
Elite 8
(1) Houston defeats (2) Tennessee
West Region
First Round
(1) Florida defeats (16) Norfolk State ✅
(8) UConn defeats (9) Oklahoma ✅
(12) Colorado State upsets (5) Memphis ✅
(4) Maryland defeats (13) Grand Canyon ✅
(11) Drake upsets (6) Missouri ✅
(3) Texas Tech defeats (14) UNC Wilmington ✅
(10) Arkansas upsets (7) Kansas ✅
(2) Tennessee defeats (15) Wofford ✅
Second Round
(1) Florida defeats (8) UConn ✅
(12) Colorado State upsets (4) Maryland ❌
(3) Texas Tech defeats (11) Drake ✅
(10) Arkansas upsets (2) Tennessee ✅
Sweet 16
(1) Florida defeats (12) Colorado State
(3) Texas Tech defeats (10) Arkansas
Elite 8
(1) Florida defeats (3) Texas Tech
Final Four
(1S) Auburn defeats (1W) Florida
(1E) Duke defeats (1MW) Houston
National Championship
(1E) Duke defeats (1S) Auburn (74-69)
—
In the first round, ChatGPT went 28 for 32 and picked some of the big upsets, including all three in the West region. ChatGPT had success in the second round too, going 14 for 16 and correctly picking the surprise Cinderella team for the Sweet 16 in 10th-seeded Arkansas.
Here’s the schedule for the 2025 NCAA men’s basketball tournament:
- First Four: March 18-19
- First round: March 20-21
- Second round: March 22-23
- Sweet 16: March 27-28
- Elite Eight: March 29-30
- Final Four: April 5
- NCAA championship game: April 7
I used a similar ChatGPT prompt for the NCAA women’s basketball tournament
The NCAA women’s basketball tournament may not be as popular as the men’s, but there are definitely pools out there, and if you’re in one, you can use ChatGPT, and a similar prompt to the one in the previous section, to fill out your bracket. Although I’m not in a pool, I asked ChatGPT just for the hell of it, and this is what it gave me for the women’s tournament:
My prompt: «Fill out a complete women’s March Madness bracket for me, with a mix of strong favorites, a few calculated upsets and at least one dark horse team making a deep run. Make sure to include the First Four. Use this as a guide: https://www.ncaa.com/brackets/basketball-women/d1/2025»
ChatGPT’s answer:
Note: Shortened to just final thoughts.
This bracket incorporates:
- Favorites: South Carolina, UCLA, USC, UConn, Texas
- Calculated Upsets: Louisville over Arizona, UConn over Texas
- A Dark Horse: Louisville’s deep run
UCLA wins the title in a West Coast showdown against USC!
