Rak Madness Basketball 2026
WELCOME to the 2026 Rak Madness Basketball tournament. This is the 33rd yr running the Madness (minus Covid) and YOU are welcome to join. Last year Kaitlin Kearney & Gregory Strootman ended in a Dead Heat, 1st time in Madness History. Kearney and Strootman welcome ALL challengers. Could it be YOU who takes home the Crown this year? The only way to find out is to play and it only costs $25 per entry... so whatta you say, "YOU WANNA PLAY ?"
CLICK HERE TO JOIN THE MADNESS
No Pay No Play – ALL Payments in by Thursday, March 19th
No doubt there might be some growing pains going into the 2nd year of doing the pool ONE hundo percent online only because I do not have any control of your picks. For instance, if you want to change your bracket name I cannot do that for you and the only instructions I found online were as follows.
How do I change the names of my brackets?
Bracket entries in Bracket Pool Manager will be named the first and last name associated with your CBSSports.com account. To change information on your account, please visit https://www.cbssports.com/settings. If you are not already logged in, you will be asked to log in.
Click Edit Settings under the Account Settings section of the page. For security reasons, you will be asked to verify your email address and password again. Once you have done that, you will be taken to the Account Settings page, where you can change your name, email address and other information. Be sure to click Save Settings at the bottom of the page when you are finished.
2026 NCAA Tournament Tips
- 100% of ALL Entries will be done online at CBS Sports
- 100% of ALL the Scoring will be done online CBS Sports including Total Pts tie-breaker
- Scoring - see round by round scoring explanation below
- Entry Fee - $25 per entry (Venmo & PayPal links below)
- CBS Sports will list Final Standings and that will be the Madness Standings for Payout purposes
- All Entries must be completed by Thursday March 19th at 12 noon est.
- IF prompted for a password to enter your picks use 2026
- IF you do not have a CBS Sports login you'll need to create one
- $25 per entry -
When paying entry via Venmo or PayPal PLEASE be very clear on the NAME of the Entry you are paying because you will not be able to change it.
SCORING
First Round – 1 Point + (Seed)
FIRST ROUND ONLY – If a #12 seed wins over a #5 seed you get 1 pt for the win and 12 more pts for the seed upset for a total of 13pts. On the contrary, if you pick a #5 seed over #12 seed and #5 seed wins, then you would get 1pt for the win and 5 more pts for seed victory for a total of 6 pts. I call this ‘The Rak Madness Twist’. You’re Welcome!
2nd Round – 5 Points
Sweet 16 – 7 Points
Elite 8 – 9 Points
Final 2 – 11 Points
Champion – 15 Points
PAY OUT - DETERMINED
Since I am unaware of the total number of entries, payouts will be in percentages depending on the number of entries.
Greater than 40 Entries, 5 Place Payout
1st Place – 55% Purse
2nd Place – 20% Purse
3rd Place – 15% Purse
4th Place – 10% Purse
5th Place – $25 Entry Fee Returned
40 Entries or Less, 4 Place Payout
1st Place – 60% Purse
2nd Place – 25% Purse
3rd Place – 15% Purse
4th Place – $25 Entry Fee Returned
Tie-breakers will be decided by on CBS SPORTS Final Standings. A year ago, when we first used CBS Sports 100% we had a tie and it was determined by CBS Sports to be a dead-heat.
In the event of a dead heat with more than 40 entries – 1st and 2nd place will be combined and split in half, 3rd place finisher will get 15% of the purse, 4th place 10% and 5th and final place will remain unchanged, entry fee returned.
In the event of a dead heat with 40 or less entries – 1st and 2nd place will be combined and split in half, 3rd place will get 15% of the purse, while 4th place will remain unchanged, entry fee returned.
NOTE – $0.75 from every entry will be taken out of the overall purse to help cover the annual Host Gator Website Costs. ALL other monies collected will go to the Purse