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Tuesday's Best Bets
February 20, 2018
Tuesday College Basketball Best Bets
As the final 10-plus days of the regular season have arrived for every college program around the country, we see the Big 10 and SEC conferences take most of center stage tonight.
The Big 10 has two of their three games featuring ranked squads looking for blowout wins after sub-par performances over the weekend in Ohio State and Michigan State, while the SEC has four games on the docket with Kentucky/Arkansas likely being the featured game of the bunch.
It's that contest, and one of the Big 10 matchups that has me excited for tonight's board, but if you are looking for excitement on the court you may want to look elsewhere as points may be hard to come by in these two contests.
Odds per - Bookmaker.eu
Best Bet #1: Illinois/Michigan State Under 146.5
Michigan State had a sub-par 1st half against Northwestern on the weekend, as the 9-point road favorites found themselves down 22 points at the break. The Spartans were able to flip the script – especially on defense – in the second half, outscoring the Wildcats 38-11 in the final 20 minutes to come back and win 65-60. Whether you're on the side of it being an epic comeback or an epic collapse is irrelevant now, but chances are that stout defense Michigan State showed in the 2nd half hasn't been lost just 72 hours later.
Michigan State has held two straight opponents to 60 or less now, and eight of their last 10 foes have failed to reach 70 against them. One of those two outliers was this Illinois team who scored 74 in a 87-74 Michigan State road win about a month ago, but I doubt we see the Illini approach 70 in the rematch. The Spartans defense will look to control the game from the outset in their final home game of the year and as 16-point favorites, the Spartans should be able to do so and squash the Illini attack from the outset. Eight of the last nine times they've hosted Illinois the 'under' has cashed, and with Michigan State is on a 1-4 O/U run after a SU win, and staying under tonight's total in each of their past four home games, I like the chances of this game staying low.
Finally, the first game between these two saw Michigan State shoot an astonishing 68.2% from the floor for the game, and when you are giving up a bucket on nearly every possession, Illinois had no choice but to play fast to try and keep up. Knowing that Michigan State's defense completely shutdown the Wildcats on Saturday likely has to to force Illinois to abandon their uptempo ideas from a gameplan perspective, as they'd love to be the third of Michigan State's last four opponents to hold them under 70 points. If Illinois is going to stay close here they've got to keep this game as a race to 60 – similar to what Northwestern did – and while Illinois won't have the overall success Northwestern did (at least for 20 minutes), their 5-17 O/U run against teams that have won 60% of their games so far, 2-8 O/U run off an ATS win, and 19-54 O/U run on the road against a winning home team suggests that at least defensively the Illini will have some success.
Odds per - Bookmaker.eu
Best Bet #2: Kentucky/Arkansas Under 153
This is a huge game for both sides in the SEC title race and because of that we should see a playoff-type atmosphere here. Arkansas is currently in the better position in 3rd place in the SEC, but with a 8-6 SU record in conference play and tied with three other foes at that mark, it really is a slippery slope the Razorbacks are on. Kentucky sits at 7-7 SU in SEC play and a SU win would put them tied with Arkansas both in conference play and overall, but the victory would give the Wildcats the head-to-head tiebreaker. That's some huge stakes with two weeks remaining for both clubs and it's why I believe we see the defenses show up in spades tonight.
Kentucky is on a 5-12 O/U run in their last 17 games away from home, and although they busted out with 81 points on Saturday in a home win over Alabama, that was just the second time in five games that they scored 70 or more. To surpass tonight's total we will need both teams to hit 75+, and while both have no problems playing fast, their defensive points allowed per game for home/away suggests this total will finish around 146 points. That's plenty of margin for error here, especially given the stakes involved.
Arkansas had an offensive explosion themselves on Saturday with 94 points in a 19-point win over Texas A&M, making it the third time this year they've scored 90+ in conference play. After the previous two, the Razorbacks have followed it up with a 1-1 O/U mark that would be 0-2 O/U had they not gone to double OT against Georgia a while back. That's a little telling in the sense that this team has trouble putting back-to-back stellar offensive performances together, and Kentucky's length and size inside will pose a problem for the Razorbacks tonight.
So with both teams looking for this crucial conference win, and Arkansas on a 0-4 O/U run in their last four against a winning foe, look for the defenses to shine more often than not tonight as this game finishes somewhere in the mid-140's unless a trip to OT ruins this 'under' play.
February 20, 2018
Tuesday College Basketball Best Bets
As the final 10-plus days of the regular season have arrived for every college program around the country, we see the Big 10 and SEC conferences take most of center stage tonight.
The Big 10 has two of their three games featuring ranked squads looking for blowout wins after sub-par performances over the weekend in Ohio State and Michigan State, while the SEC has four games on the docket with Kentucky/Arkansas likely being the featured game of the bunch.
It's that contest, and one of the Big 10 matchups that has me excited for tonight's board, but if you are looking for excitement on the court you may want to look elsewhere as points may be hard to come by in these two contests.
Odds per - Bookmaker.eu
Best Bet #1: Illinois/Michigan State Under 146.5
Michigan State had a sub-par 1st half against Northwestern on the weekend, as the 9-point road favorites found themselves down 22 points at the break. The Spartans were able to flip the script – especially on defense – in the second half, outscoring the Wildcats 38-11 in the final 20 minutes to come back and win 65-60. Whether you're on the side of it being an epic comeback or an epic collapse is irrelevant now, but chances are that stout defense Michigan State showed in the 2nd half hasn't been lost just 72 hours later.
Michigan State has held two straight opponents to 60 or less now, and eight of their last 10 foes have failed to reach 70 against them. One of those two outliers was this Illinois team who scored 74 in a 87-74 Michigan State road win about a month ago, but I doubt we see the Illini approach 70 in the rematch. The Spartans defense will look to control the game from the outset in their final home game of the year and as 16-point favorites, the Spartans should be able to do so and squash the Illini attack from the outset. Eight of the last nine times they've hosted Illinois the 'under' has cashed, and with Michigan State is on a 1-4 O/U run after a SU win, and staying under tonight's total in each of their past four home games, I like the chances of this game staying low.
Finally, the first game between these two saw Michigan State shoot an astonishing 68.2% from the floor for the game, and when you are giving up a bucket on nearly every possession, Illinois had no choice but to play fast to try and keep up. Knowing that Michigan State's defense completely shutdown the Wildcats on Saturday likely has to to force Illinois to abandon their uptempo ideas from a gameplan perspective, as they'd love to be the third of Michigan State's last four opponents to hold them under 70 points. If Illinois is going to stay close here they've got to keep this game as a race to 60 – similar to what Northwestern did – and while Illinois won't have the overall success Northwestern did (at least for 20 minutes), their 5-17 O/U run against teams that have won 60% of their games so far, 2-8 O/U run off an ATS win, and 19-54 O/U run on the road against a winning home team suggests that at least defensively the Illini will have some success.
Odds per - Bookmaker.eu
Best Bet #2: Kentucky/Arkansas Under 153
This is a huge game for both sides in the SEC title race and because of that we should see a playoff-type atmosphere here. Arkansas is currently in the better position in 3rd place in the SEC, but with a 8-6 SU record in conference play and tied with three other foes at that mark, it really is a slippery slope the Razorbacks are on. Kentucky sits at 7-7 SU in SEC play and a SU win would put them tied with Arkansas both in conference play and overall, but the victory would give the Wildcats the head-to-head tiebreaker. That's some huge stakes with two weeks remaining for both clubs and it's why I believe we see the defenses show up in spades tonight.
Kentucky is on a 5-12 O/U run in their last 17 games away from home, and although they busted out with 81 points on Saturday in a home win over Alabama, that was just the second time in five games that they scored 70 or more. To surpass tonight's total we will need both teams to hit 75+, and while both have no problems playing fast, their defensive points allowed per game for home/away suggests this total will finish around 146 points. That's plenty of margin for error here, especially given the stakes involved.
Arkansas had an offensive explosion themselves on Saturday with 94 points in a 19-point win over Texas A&M, making it the third time this year they've scored 90+ in conference play. After the previous two, the Razorbacks have followed it up with a 1-1 O/U mark that would be 0-2 O/U had they not gone to double OT against Georgia a while back. That's a little telling in the sense that this team has trouble putting back-to-back stellar offensive performances together, and Kentucky's length and size inside will pose a problem for the Razorbacks tonight.
So with both teams looking for this crucial conference win, and Arkansas on a 0-4 O/U run in their last four against a winning foe, look for the defenses to shine more often than not tonight as this game finishes somewhere in the mid-140's unless a trip to OT ruins this 'under' play.
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