Fans of the Iowa State Cyclones were ranked as the most optimistic fans ahead of March Madness. Despite not being one of the most backed teams, 26% of fans believe the squad can deliver their first ever National Championship.

Surprisingly, The Texas Tech Red Raiders, who have even longer odds than the Cyclones had the second most optimistic fans, with a quarter (25%) being hyped for the tournament.

The UConn Huskies are the reigning champions and go into this year as the favorites. Huskies’ fans had a strong online positive sentiment score of 23%. However, this may have been higher if their unbeaten run hadn’t ended against Creighton.

Houston, Kansas and Duke fans all had the same positive sentiment score as the Huskies (23%).

While this optimism may be slightly surprising for the Jayhawks and Blue Devils fans this year, the Cougars are expected to be one of the teams who could seriously challenge UConn for their crown. 

The table below shows the top 10 most optimistic college basketball fans.

On the other hand, Clemson fans were the least optimistic with a lowly positive sentiment score of 7%.

Many see Tennessee as potential contenders, but this optimism isn’t shared by Vols supporters, who were surprisingly in the top ten least optimistic fans with a positive sentiment score of just 8%.

The table below shows the top 10 least optimistic fans.

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