College Basketball Best Bets Today:

We’re about 50 or 60 games short of what a regular college basketball Saturday will look like down the line, but we still have 73 games to think about for today and that is more than enough to find some plays. There are a lot of early games, though, and with the timing of this article, I want to make sure everybody has enough lead time to check it out, so 4 or 5 p.m. ET will be the earliest game I will suggest as this article moves forward.

There are still plenty of games on the slate to think about and analyze from that point on, so let’s get to the action.

 

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Tracking sheet is here. 2023-24 for reference is here.

This article will run Monday-Saturday. Lines will be from DraftKings, as they are widely available to readers. Shop around for the best prices.

Shout-outs to Bart Torvik, Erik Haslam, and Ken Pomeroy, as those are my three primary resources for information when handicapping.

Check the latest college basketball odds for legal U.S. sportsbooks across the country and our Vegas odds if you share a state with us here at VSiN. Also, give the college basketball betting splits a look for these or any other college basketball games today have your interest.

Odds from DraftKings Sportsbook at time of publish.

East Tennessee State Buccaneers at Davidson Wildcats (-6.5, 144.5)

5 p.m. ET

We start in North Carolina, where Davidson hosts East Tennessee State. Neither one of these teams really did much in the transfer portal, so what we see is what we get, with three notable exceptions. ETSU’s leading scorer Ebby Asamoah and Davidson’s No. 1 and No. 3 in points per game, David Skogman and Grant Huffman, are gone.

ETSU was a bad offense with Asamoah, as they finished 316th in eFG% offense, 307th in 3P%, and 299th in 2P% per Torvik. Most of the same inefficient shooters are back. This was a team that was even 23rd in ORB% according to Torvik and still couldn’t find offensive success as a result. Jadyn Parker, who was the team’s second-leading rebounder and top guy on the offensive glass, is gone, too.

Matt McKillop took over for his dad for the 2022-23 season and his teams have shot 31.9% and 30.7% from 3. Dating back to 2008, his dad’s teams never shot under 33.7% and finished inside the top 100 in 3P% eight times, including fourth in his final season, where the team went 27-7 and made the NCAA Tournament. McKillop has 31 wins in his two seasons combined.

ETSU should slow the pace down in this game, as they don’t want to get into a jump-shooting contest with the Wildcats. Davidson gave up a lot of points eight days ago to Bowling Green, but I don’t think we see similar shooting numbers from Davidson or ETSU in this one.

Pick: Under 144.5

Central Connecticut Blue Devils vs. Northeastern Huskies (-3, 138)

6 p.m. ET

We head to Moncton, New Brunswick for some hoops north of the border here, as Central Connecticut and Northeastern square off in a neutral setting. CCSU head coach Patrick Sellers deserves a lot of credit, as the Blue Devils won 20 games last season and went 11-3 in league play. They had 18 combined wins in his first two seasons and the team had a total of 20 wins in Donyell Marshall’s last three seasons at the helm.

But, the Blue Devils lost a lot from last year’s team. Leading scorer Allan Jeanne-Rose shot 57% on 2s, as the Fairfield transfer was the top inside scoring threat with 169 attempts on Close Twos. He had 21 dunks. Kellen Amos is now at Rice. He had 20 dunks. Tre Breland, who shot 35.5% from 3 exhausted his eligibility. Jeanne-Rose was a 36.5% shooter on 52 3-point attempts.

I think scoring will be a problem for CCSU. Meanwhile, Bill Coen at Northeastern runs an offense predicated on getting to the rim a lot. The Huskies were a top-20 unit in shot share on Close Twos and shot nearly 60% on them. That matters a lot more in a neutral, unfamiliar setting in my mind as well.

Northeastern has some losses, too, in Masai Troutman and Chris Doherty, who had the highest Usage Rate on the team, but I trust in the consistency of the offense. From 2018-20, Coen had three teams in the top 12 in eFG% offense. The transfer portal has made life tougher on his team, as it has most low-major squads, but this is a Northeastern team that is -3 on a neutral against a Central Connecticut team that beat Saint Joseph’s and hung with Providence. The line seems to tell something of a story here.

Pick: Northeastern -3

Siena Saints at Albany Great Danes (-4, 146.5)

7 p.m. ET

Siena is 3-0 for first-year head coach, and Syracuse legend, Gerry McNamara. They’ve prevailed twice in overtime against superior opponents and then took care of their affairs at home against American last time out. The quality of competition hasn’t moved them up the rankings board much, but this is a completely different team.

Siena has been a consideration for me in every game so far, but I’ve yet to pull the trigger…until now. I think this is a good matchup for the Saints, who have a 41.4% ORB% through their first three games. This is an undersized Albany team that does not run deep on the interior. It is also a Great Danes bunch that fouls a ton. They were 308th in FT Rate against last season and rank 353rd so far in games against Division I opponents.

Albany has allowed a 46.4% shot share on Close Twos to Army and Dartmouth, who shot 66.7% on those attempts. Given the offensive rebounding prowess for Siena, I think they’re going to get some chances in there.

This should also be a more reasonable matchup for Siena’s defense than what they dealt with against Brown and Bryant. Albany lost leading man Sebastian Thomas to Rhode Island and 6-foot-10 Jonathan Beagle is now at Richmond. Muneer Newton also transferred to Delaware State. Beagle and Newton were the team’s top rebounders. Senior Tyler Bertram shot 36% from 3.

If Siena stays on this path, we’ll stop getting good numbers on them pretty quickly. I’m hoping I didn’t miss the boat and that I can still safely swim to it. The culture has completely changed at Siena, where guys were hurt all season last year and questionable on a regular basis. The team won four games and can match that total tonight in their fourth game of the season.

Pick: Siena +4

Cal State Northridge Matadors (-3.5, 144) at Sacramento State Hornets

8 p.m. ET

Cal State Northridge ventures up to “The Nest” in Sacramento for this Big West vs. Big Sky battle. Head coach Andy Newman is a guy that I really like and CSUN was a popular pick for me in his first season last year. The Matadors were 19-15 and just 9-11 in Big West play, but there is a lot to like about Newman and his offensive philosophy.

Northridge was ninth in shot share on Close Twos last season. The problem for them is that opponents shot over 33% on a 44.5% 3P Rate. Sacramento State’s top players have career 3-point percentages at the Division I level of 28.1% (Jacob Holt), 27.9% (Alex Kovatchev), 26.5% (Emil Skytta), 32.8% (Bailey Nunn), 28% (EJ Neal), 28.6% (Julian Vaughns), 35% (Bowyn Beatty, 7-foot C), and 66.7% (Lachlan Brewer, freshman with six attempts).

Holt and Beatty are some nice rim protection for the Hornets because of their size, and they have held Fresno State and UC San Diego to 42.1% on 2-point shots, but I’ll still take my chances on a team that consistently gets to the rim and can get to the free throw line. Thus far, Sac State has a 29.6% shot share on Close Twos, which ranks 323rd in the nation.

Newman also has far more head coaching experience than first-year bench boss Michael Czepil for the Hornets, who took over for basketball lifer David Patrick and, to this point, doesn’t seem to have changed much yet.

This line did tick up a point overnight on the Matadors and I tend to agree.

Pick: Cal State Northridge -3.5

Fresno State Bulldogs at Cal State Bakersfield Roadrunners (-1, 151.5)

9:30 p.m. ET

We have a very interesting game here between Fresno State and Cal State Bakersfield. This is a homecoming for first-year Fresno State head coach Vance Walberg, who played at Cal State in the late ‘70s and got a physical education degree from the school in 1978. The Walberg hire has been under the microscope as a non-traditional coaching move, as he hadn’t coached in any capacity at the Division I level since 2011 as an assistant with UMass.

He was actually coaching at Clovis West High School before taking the Fresno State gig. So far, the Bulldogs are 1-1 on his watch with a win over Sacramento State and a cover as a double-digit pup against UC Santa Barbara.

Walberg is and has always been an offensive innovator, as he is said to be the creator of the dribble drive attack offense. It is not an offense that Rod Barnes’ Roadrunners employ. In fact, they regularly rank among the highest teams in percentage of shot share on mid-range jumpers. You may have noticed I’m not a fan of those. They are low-percentage shots without the ROI of taking a 3-pointer.

Last season, CSUB was one of five teams with a 40% or higher shot share on Farther Twos as defined by Torvik. Not surprisingly, CSUB was 310th in eFG%, a step up from 351st in 2021-22 and 356th in 2022-23. They were 315th in 2P%. And they’re a team that plays at a slow pace, so they have a lot of empty offensive possessions.

They also foul a ton. Since Barnes took over in 2011-12, the Roadrunners have ranked 335th, 345th, 332nd, 334th, 289th, 340th, 340th, 352nd, 350th, 334th, 357th, 355th and 357th in FT Rate against.

Fresno State has done a good job of taking care of the basketball in their first two games. If they do that again here, they’ll parade to the line and should also have the better shot selection.

Pick: Fresno State +1

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