March Madness brackets require a final score in the championship game - here's one of the most likely outcomes

AP Photo/David J. Phillip

Nailing the score of the final game could put your bracket over the top.

• March Madness brackets require a score prediction for the final game of the tournament.
• We determined the average score of the final games over the last 29 years by calculating the average combined scores of the two teams, the average individual score, and the average winning margin.
• The math is imperfect, but we found the average score to be 76-67.
• Check out the rest of our March Madness coverage here.

No one has ever gotten a perfect March Madness bracket.

But all brackets, in the event of a tie, require a score prediction in the final game of the NCAA Tournament as a tiebreaker. Even if two people tie in a pool with imperfect brackets, the final score could decide who wins the pool.

Predicting a score can be tricky, and plenty of people like to go off past examples as a framework.

We tracked the scores of every March Madness final going back to 1990 to find the most common result. We averaged the total combined scores of the two teams, the average individual score, and the average winning margin.

The average total score was 143, meaning the average individual score was 71.5 for both final teams. The average winning margin was nine points. Therefore, the average score of the final games over the last 19 years has been 76-67.

The math is imperfect, but 76-67 would be a safe bet to make on a bracket.

However, it's also worth noting what could have affected those numbers.

For instance, there may be some outliers that affected the average spread of the games. In 1990, UNLV beat Duke 103-73, the largest disparity over the last 29 years. The final game in the NCAA Tournament has only been decided by ten or more points nine other times.

How likely is the final score prediction to come into play in a bracket pool? Not very. But every pick matters. Nailing the final score could be the difference-maker for some lucky player's bracket.

• Read more:
• 6 tips for filling out your March Madness bracket
• We picked March Madness favorites, sleepers, and Cinderellas for every region in the bracket
• Here is who the experts are picking to make the Final Four in March Madness
• The highest-paid coaches in the NCAA Tournament