Kentucky unbeaten prop still alive after Notre Dame blows late lead

When the game started, Notre Dame was a long shot. It ended with Jerian Grant firing a 3-point shot from the corner that was long, and Kentucky escaped with its perfect record intact Saturday.

“That was a shame,” said Nick Bogdanovich, William Hill sports book director. “Notre Dame led the entire way and just choked it. They should have won that game.”

In the latest NCAA Tournament thriller, the Wildcats mounted a late comeback to beat the Fighting Irish 68-66, a result that left Bogdanovich and most bookmakers less than thrilled.

William Hill books would suffer six-figure losses if Kentucky (38-0) wins the national championship, due to a prop posted last summer. The Wildcats opened at 50-1 odds to go undefeated, and they entered the tournament as even-money favorites.

“That prop would have been nice to get rid of,” Bogdanovich said.

The Irish, 11-point underdogs and around plus-600 on the money line, led by six with six minutes to play but faltered down the stretch and failed to score on their final three possessions.

“You play a poised game throughout, and then at the end you panic,” Wynn Las Vegas sports book director John Avello said. “Kentucky figures out ways to win.”

With six seconds to go, Grant took a short inbounds pass and dribbled the length of the floor before throwing up a shot that was tightly contested. Notre Dame coach Mike Brey had used all of his timeouts and was unable to draw up a more effective play.

“If you lead the entire second half, you’ve got to have a timeout left,” Bogdanovich said. “You’ve got to get a better shot.”

So for Kentucky, it’s on to Wisconsin. Avello opened the Wildcats as 6½-point favorites over the Badgers in the Final Four on Saturday in Indianapolis. The line opened at 5½ and 6 at a few offshore books.

Wisconsin, a 1-point underdog, eliminated Arizona 85-78 in the West Region final Saturday. Frank Kaminsky scored 29 points and Sam Dekker 27 for the Badgers, who made 10 of 12 3-pointers in the second half.

“Wisconsin played pretty much a perfect game, and they need to play the same game again, and that might not be enough,” Avello said. “I’ll start it at 6½. My power ratings are a little less than that, but sometimes my mind overrides the rating, and that’s what I did in this case. I’ll let the bettors decide.”

The betting public cleaned up Friday, when all four favorites covered. Duke, favored by 5 to 5½ points, beat Utah 63-57. After an officiating review, the Blue Devils’ Quinn Cook was awarded two free throws in the last second, and he hit the second one in an ending that caused an uproar.

“That last free throw was worth about $350,000 to the book,” Bogdanovich said. “We were buried on Duke. It was a huge, huge, huge swing.”

Contact reporter Matt Youmans at myoumans@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2907. Follow him on Twitter: @mattyoumans247.