mike

Has anyone been to Vegas during the first rounds of the NCAA tournament? I was wondering which sports books were the best to watch the games and which ones had the best odds. I've always heard about Caesars but what about Mandalay Bay or other ones?

dcp

Am I jealous! I've been to Vegas lots of times including Super Bowl weekend, NBA, stanley cup & college finals but never during the first week of March madness (always wanted to). Mandalay Bay has a great sports book but so do most of the large hotels. I actually prefer to watch at a smaller casino book if I really want to watch and listen to the game(s). The big books fill up early so seating is usually an issue and they're so-crowded it's hard to listen to the game. Enjoy!

John

I've gone to LV every year for the past 10 seasons to watch the first 2 rounds of the NCAA's, Mike.

Has it ever changed.
Back in the day (1991-2) the sports books were accommodating, fun, comfortable and while crowded, not painfully so.
The last 2 years the NCAA's have gotten so big it almost makes me want to go somewhere besides LV.

Example: stayed at Four Seasons last year and got up 'early' Thursday AM to go down to the sports book (Mandalay) to place bets. At 8AM local time there were over 100 people in line at the windows.
No way in the world could you get a seat or table to watch games.
We stood the entire time.....hours on end, packed like sardines.
Not pleasant.
And all the sports books (with decent viewing set ups) have gotten this way.
LV Hilton is the biggest viewing room and it's not quite as bad, but a whole lot worse than it used to be.
Bellagio, NYNY, Caesar's, Bally's, Treasure Island.....you name it, we've been to them all the past couple years and they're packed to the point that people stand 5 deep for partial views of one TV screen at peak times.

Success is spoiling things.
Someone needs to build a bigger/better sports book.

mike

Well, that's discouraging. I didn't think that they would be that overcrowded. I guess I'm used to going to crowded sports bars to watch games but if you're going to be there all day, you would hope it would be a little more comfortable. Well, we'll have people staked out as soon as the doors open so at least we'll give it out best shot at getting a seat.

John

Mike: the doors are always open. The sports books are in casinos, which, of course, never close in LV. So you can go down really early to stake out seats. Problem is that it's hard to make yourself get up at 6 AM in LV to do anything (unless you haven't been to bed yet).
But you've got the right idea. Whatever effort you make to stake out seats pays off big IMO.
Hope you have a great time. We'll be back for year #11 next week. Now if I could just figure out which Duke team is going to show up this year.......

Steve

Can't agree with John more. I've been the past 2 years for the first 2 rounds, and it's a zoo. It is also spring break at that time, so the entire town is crawling with degenerate gamblers, and college kids on a week long bender. Add to that that the demand for rooms makes this one of, if not the, most expensive weekends of the year, and you get the picture. For example, last year we got a suite at the MGM for $269/night. This year, they want $305 for the same suite. I checked the rate for that same suite for the weekend of the final four, and it's going for $189/night.