Warren Buffett may be offering a billion dollars for the person who can correctly pick all the winning teams in their college basketball bracket, but we think the reward should really go to the colleges who do the best job educating their students, while still winning basketball tournaments. That’s why we’ve created our own spin on the brackets, for both men and women.  Our comparison tool has colleges compete by their academic quality as well as athletic superiority. Heavily weighted factors in our metrics include athletic competitiveness, overall college quality, student athlete academic progress, and other factors like athletic aid.  The rankings for these brackets are specific to the school’s basketball team.

Athletic programs can be a big draw for students, and for some colleges are big money-makers.  No parent wants to risk sending their student to a school where they won’t get the instruction and guidance needed to compete in the classroom as well as on the field.  Our college quality rating includes important values based on student outcomes like graduate rates, post-graduate earnings, and student loan default rates.

You can also dig deeper into each college's profile to view details on their sports programs, including how much money is made or spent, average athletic aid, and a rating of academics and team competitiveness individual to each sport. View both brackets below:

2014 Men's Bracket

2014 Women's Bracket

Take a look and let us know what you think!  What colleges did you pick for your final four?  How did they do in our brackets?

The College Recruiting Formula

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