College Basketball Best Bets Today:

It is a light evening on the college basketball slate on Thursday with 23 games to consider. A conference clash with Purdue and Penn State easily takes the top spot for Game of the Night, as we’re seeing a handful of conference games this week. After a bevy of big games the last couple of nights, it isn’t a big surprise to have a bit of a step back.

Yesterday was actually the one-month anniversary of the start of the season. We’re still finding out a ton about these teams and can hopefully make some stronger determinations as the statistical profiles shake out. The imbalanced schedules are still a major factor in line moves and something to consider, but the context of how a team has fared against a stronger or weaker schedule needs to be analyzed thoroughly, rather than a blanket play on or against a school.

 

***Top College Basketball Betting Resources***

*Join thousands of other sports bettors and unlock access to picks, public betting splits data, & the VSiN live video broadcast by upgrading to VSiN Pro. Grab your first month for less than $10.*

Onward we go into the Thursday card.

We have a ton of content rolling in here at VSiN on a daily basis, so you may want to bookmark our College Basketball Articles page so you can find this and also Greg Peterson’s top CBB bets of the day.

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.

Southeastern Louisiana Lions at Nicholls Colonels (-2, 139)

7:30 p.m. ET

We’ve got conference action in the Southland between Southeastern Louisiana and Nicholls. The Colonels are favored by a deuce here and a little bit of money has creeped in on the Lions, as they have played a little bit tougher of a schedule. But, I see a lot of points of positive statistical regression in the profile for Nicholls.

Let’s start with this – they have a shot share of 45% on Close Twos, which ranks 38th, but they are only shooting 45.3% on those shots. That ranks 358th. The Colonels have played some pretty good defensive teams thus far, including Cincinnati (17-of-51 on 2s) and Northern Kentucky (14-of-45 on 2s). They were 17-of-33 against a solid Towson crew. They played the Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky games on back-to-back days.

SELA is not a good defensive team and hasn’t been at really any point on David Kiefer’s watch. A high TO% hasn’t even been enough to help in the adjusted defensive efficiency department, as they’ve been 266th or worse per Torvik during his first five seasons. They’re 171st this season, but that will regress.

The other area I’m expecting positive regression for Nicholls is in the turnover department. Once again, they’ve played some tough teams that take really good care of the basketball. They didn’t excel in this area last season at 16.4% for now 29-year-old head coach Tevon Saddler, but they’re facing a team turning it over on more than 20% of its possessions for the first time this season against a Division I opponent. Right now, the Colonels have just a 12.2% TO% that ranks 358th. That will improve as well.

SELA has a decent big in Brody Rowbury, but he’s not a great rebounder and hasn’t recorded a lot of blocked shots. I think this is a good chance for Nicholls to see improvement in several key stat categories.

Pick: Nicholls -2

Northwestern State Demons at Incarnate Word Cardinals (-5, 140)

8 p.m. ET

Another Southland showdown caught my eye for tonight, as Northwestern State and Incarnate Word get together. Let’s look at the context of this game first. Northwestern State won last year’s two head-to-head meetings by 26 and 20, but we’ve got some money coming in on Incarnate Word in this one.

That’s because head coach Shane Heirman brought in some solid transfers, including two really good shooters from Ball State in Jalin Anderson and Davion Bailey. So far, UIW is firing away at a 41.5% clip with the help of those two and more playing time for Dylan Hayman. JUCO transfer Jordan Pyke has also been terrific.

Heirman reinvented the roster after last season, letting go of some high TO% guys and inefficient shooters. He took the job in late April and likely didn’t get to put together the roster that he wanted. Now, he has. It is a UIW team with a higher shot share on Close Twos and a much better presence from 3-point land than Northwestern State.

However, the Cardinals are scary on defense. They’ve played six games against Division I opponents and five of them have scored at least 1.132 points per possession. Arkansas Pine Bluff, who may be the worst team in the country, only had .953 PPP. Everybody else has scored at will, but the Cardinals have been able to outscore two of them and have scored 78 and 74 points in two of the losses.

Three players play over 80% of the minutes for UIW and they’re all performing at a high level offensively. Now that it’s conference play, I would expect NW State to tighten up their rotation a bit as well.

Northwestern State has played a much tougher schedule and that has skewed some of their offensive numbers. They had .834 PPP against Oklahoma and .761 PPP against LSU. This is a step back defensively compared to most of the teams that they’ve played, but I still have offensive concerns about them given that last season’s top producers are gone and I don’t think head coach Rick Cabrera did the best job bringing talent back in.

Nevertheless, I do think the Demons score more here than they have. Unfortunately for them, I don’t think it’s enough to beat Incarnate Word or cover this spread. But, I am expecting both teams to score and the Southland Conference officials are very whistle-happy. This conference was fifth in FT Rate last season.

Picks: Incarnate Word -5 and Over 140

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR