First Time Filling out a March Madness Bracket? Here’s What "PCT" Means

With March Madness 2026 underway, folks have been fervently looking at their brackets to see how their picks are performing. And if you're a seasoned sports fan who's participated in countless bracket-style tournaments, then you're going to be very familiar with this numbers game.

However, others who aren't as well-versed might be left scratching their heads as to what all of the terms, acronyms, and abbreviations associated with their tournament challenge brackets are. And a lot of folks have been wondering: What does PCT mean?

As written by ESPN, PCT is shorthand for "percentile," and this directly refers to "the percentile your performance falls within, graded against all other entrants in the game." Similarly, PTS (points) stands for how many points your team has accumulated since the tournament started. And RK, an abbreviated form of the word rank, is the rank of a team measured against all other entrants in the bracket.

The sports network also provided a sample image of what a tournament-style bracket may look like. Essentially, the higher the number of points accrued in a March Madness bracket, the better. The same goes for percentage, and the lower your rank number, the better it is, as it means you're outperforming the picks others have made.

In 2025, this X user published a post showing off a 99.3 percentile and 180k rank when compared to others who've filled out brackets on ESPN's tournament challenge. Her strategy? Selecting teams based on how miserable they looked in their team photographs.

She specified in a supplemental post: "The funniest part of my 99 PCT March Madness bracket is I picked whatever team looked less miserable."

Seeing as how other folks had their own hopes of fulfilling a perfect bracket dashed early on, it would seem that her strategy may be a good one for those just entering the bracket tournament game.

And it seems like basing one's picks solely on team names and "vibes," as this other naive March Madness tournament bracket participant did, may work out in one's favor. "I know absolutely nothing about college basketball (is that even it?) But my March Madness bracket is never that bad."

They added: "I know nothing about any of these teams and solely pick on names and vibes lol." And this year, there may be more new March Madness participants than ever. That's because the prediction (betting?) platform is promising $1 billion to folks who manage to complete a "perfect" March Madness bracket.

Kalshi's website states that if a perfect bracket, which has never been recorded in the history of March Madness, ever, isn't attained, then the top-scoring bracket gets $1 million. But if someone does manage to get every single March Madness victory correct, then they'll be $1 billion richer.

For current March Madness standings, check the NCAA website here. Currently, the Arizona Wildcats are favored to win their first title since 1997. Michigan and Duke are trailing closely behind in terms of Bet365 odds, with Florida, Houston, Iowa State, Illinois, Purdue, and UConn rounding out the top 9, as per Covers.