The Most Outstanding Player award appears to be Cooper Flagg’s to lose. At nearly-even +105 odds to win it, Flagg is also the presumptive national player of the year and likely No. 1 pick for the 2025 NBA Draft.
If Duke wins — and the Blue Devils are -110 on BetMGM to claim the title — it’s hard to imagine anyone else getting the honor.
Of course, it’s possible, though unlikely, that a player on a losing team takes home the MOP crown.
In men’s tournament history, a player on a non-title squad has won Most Outstanding Player just 11 times. Four of those times, the player was on a team that didn’t even make the championship game: Hal Lear of third-place Temple in 1956, Art Heyman of third-place Duke in 1963, Bill Bradley of third-place Princeton in 1965 and Jerry Chambers of fourth(!)-place Utah in 1966.
Howard Porter is the lone player whose MOP award, with Villanova in 1971, was vacated because of an eligibility issue. Villanova was the runner-up to UCLA that year, so he would be the 12th on the list of non-winning MOPs if his award stood.
Houston’s Akeem Olajuwon (later changed to Hakeem) was the most recent player to win MOP on the losing squad — way back in 1983.
Fun fact: In the history of the women’s tournament, only one player has ever received MOP honors…
