I may have had better brackets since then, but the closest I came to big money was a large pool in 1991 (yeah, I'm old. Shut up). If KU had beaten Duke in final, I would've gotten something like $300 (that's about $500 today). As it was, I got $30, which was fine, considering there were a ton of people in it, and since I thought taking Kansas that far was a stretch in that tournament. That's also the year I truly caught the pool fever, unsurprisingly.
(I still have some of the paper ones for some office pools I organized, but no time to check).
As much of a tournament fanatic as I am, I don't do all that well. I almost never do poorly, either, unless too many favorites win or unless a tournament is just nuts (2000, for example).