The Final Four stage is set for the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament as Illinois, Michigan, UConn, and Arizona prepare to battle it out for a trip to the national championship.
For brands, March Madness delivers a unique blend of live sports intensity, cultural moments, and unpredictable results. According to insights from EDO’s 2025 Basketball Report, last year’s NCAA men’s title game was 158% more effective than the average primetime program on broadcast or cable.
For marketers, this creates an open lane to reach emotionally invested and leaned-in audiences at scale. As EDO continues to follow the Big Dance, we’ve compiled data on the brands that have been winning the tournament so far.
Buffalo Wild Wings tops the charts
The top five brands driving engagement, like site visits and web searches, reflect an interesting mix of categories.
This year, Buffalo Wild Wings leads the charge, capturing 5.2% of share of total ad-driven engagement through the Elite Eight round, maximizing the synergy between the annual event and sports bar culture.
Close behind is AT&T Wireless at 4.8% and from there, quick-service and fast-casual brands like Taco Bell (3.6%) and Qdoba Mexican Eats (2.8%) staked their engagement claim. Sandwiched between the two is Starlink (3.3%), the satellite internet provider that famously made its TV advertising debut at the 2025 Super Bowl.
Starlink makes a splash
Starlink’s strong performance was bolstered by a spot that placed the brand in the long arc of scientific progress and promised consumers “fast, affordable internet.” The creative generated the most total engagement of any tournament ad during the weekend of the Sweet Sixteen and Elite Eight.
Elsewhere in the realm of future-focused technology, Google Gemini notched the creative that drove the third-most engagement of any spot during the weekend of the Sweet Sixteen and the Elite Eight.
The ad tied into March Madness with sportscasters breathlessly announcing how a woman used Gemini to scan her lease to find out if she could paint her apartment.
The brands driving the most engagement aren’t all playing the same game. Some are leaning into fandom and culture, while others are employing brand storytelling. The throughline is that all of them are engaging audiences in a way that aligns with how viewers are experiencing the moment.
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