Has anyone ever had a perfect bracket for March Madness? The odds and precedents for NCAA predictions

With the 2024 NCAA men's tournament underway and the women's tournament set to begin Friday, the chase for the perfect March Madness bracket has also officially begun. While anyone has a chance to get it completely right, odds are 1 in 9.2. quintillion, according to the NCAA. 

In other words, as Tim Chartier, a mathematics and computer science professor at Davidson College in North Carolina, told CBS News, it's like picking a single second in 297 billion years. "It's very difficult," he said. 

As of Thursday afternoon, after only four games, the NCAA estimates only 11% of the men's tournament brackets remain perfect.