College Basketball Best Bets Today:

We have 56 games on the docket for Tuesday and this is the best college hoops schedule we’ve had so far this year. Auburn vs. North Carolina, Duke vs. Kansas, and Alabama vs. Houston are the headliners, but there are a lot of games featuring teams that are likely to play deep into March.

We’ve also got all kinds of tournament action, so the games started early once again, including the 10:30 a.m. PT game between Chicago State and Drexel. So, once again, I remind you that I start handicapping games for the article with the 4 p.m. ET window in hopes of giving everybody some lead time on the action.

 

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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.

Grand Canyon Lopes (-1.5, 143.5) vs Stanford Cardinal

7 p.m. ET

Grand Canyon and Stanford square off in Palm Springs in the Acrisure Holiday Invitational. We’ve seen a line move on Grand Canyon here, but I think the betting market is wrong in this instance. Stanford is likely being punished for a weaker schedule. KenPom and Bart Torvik have opposite favorites here, as Torvik does have GCU nearly a one-point favorite, while KP has Stanford as the higher-rated team.

And I get that Stanford hasn’t played teams like Western Kentucky, who Grand Canyon trailed by 6 with less than 90 seconds left before pulling off a miracle win, or Arizona State, who GCU lost to by 11.

As you know, shot selection matters a lot to me. Opponents have taken a Close Two on 49.6% of shots against the Lopes. They’ve only made 51.8% of them, a number that should regress against Stanford, who boasts a monster in 7-foot-1 Maxime Raynaud, who is averaging 22.8 points and 12.8 rebounds per game this season. He had 16 rebounds, including 10 ORebs, against Santa Clara last time out.

Grand Canyon has nobody to match up with him down low and he is also off to a 48% start from 3. It won’t continue, but he stretches out the defense and allows guards to get to the rim. GCU’s defense has also been aided by a 21.1% TO%, but Stanford takes good care of the ball and most Kyle Smith teams have during his career.

Pick: Stanford +1.5

Wagner Seahawks at Georgetown Hoyas (-14.5, 128)

7 p.m. ET

The worry in this game for Georgetown would be the expected pace relative to the big spread. You can see the total there in the upper 120s, as Donald Copeland’s Wagner team plays pretty slowly. They always have. They lost 54-28 back on November 16 to Seton Hall in a game played to just 53 possessions.

In three games against major-conference opponents, the Seahawks have scored 52, 45, and 28 points, with .753, .700, and .525 points per possession. Georgetown isn’t as good as Rutgers, St. John’s, or Seton Hall, but Ed Cooley is starting to build this program back up a little bit. There is a monumental talent discrepancy between the two teams. And while this line has already moved a couple of points, I don’t think it has moved high enough.

Wagner is shooting 25% (351st) on 3s and 36.4% on 2s (363rd) against Division I teams, with those rankings per Torvik. They’re also shooting under 65% on free throws. Plus, they have nearly a 21% TO%. Against teams of Wagner’s ilk, Georgetown has scored 1.164, 1.004, 1.124, and 1.154 PPP.

If we put this game around 64 possessions or so, that puts Georgetown around 71 points and Wagner should struggle to crack 55 in this game. It’s also worth pointing out that Georgetown is forcing teams into bad jump shots. They have a 29.7% shot share against on Close Twos. Wagner is an awful jump-shooting team. They’ve made just 43.8% of their shots at the rim, but are shooting 27% from the mid-range and 25% on 3s. This should also be a game for positive regression for Georgetown from 3, as their 28.1% 3P% is definitely lower than it should be.

Cooley’s roster has a lot of freshmen, so he may empty the bench, but he’ll have a lot of young guys excited to go out there and play, so I don’t think they go into a shell at all.

Pick: Georgetown -14.5

Loyola Marymount Lions vs. Belmont Bruins (-1.5, 151.5)

8:30 p.m. ET

We should all be so lucky as to head to Riviera Maya at this time of year, but Loyola Marymount and Belmont are there on a business trip. The two teams face off in the final game of the night at the Cancun Challenge. The Lions are off to a rough start with a win over lower-division LIFE Pacific and three losses to D-I foes. The most disappointing thing was the four-point home loss to North Dakota as a double-digit favorite on Friday.

This is a real simple handicap for me. You have an unfamiliar venue and a jump-shot-oriented team like Loyola Marymount against a high-percentage shot selection offense in Belmont. Casey Alexander’s crew has been hurt by the defense, but this is a team that ranks 20th in eFG% offense. They’re shooting 67.4% at the rim and have also made nearly 38% of their 3s.

Belmont’s lack of rim protection on defense isn’t as big of a deal here, as 6-foot-11 Jevon Porter is an inefficient interior scorer and 6-foot-8 Alex Merkviladze plays more as a wing. Merkviladze led the team in shot attempts at the rim last season with 97, as the team had 556 attempts on Close Twos, but 478 mid-range jumpers. A lot of last season’s efficiency on 2s went out the door and 45% 3-point shooter Dominick Harris went to UCLA.

Loyola Marymount was 308th last season in shot share on Close Twos. But teams took a lot of 3s and made a lot of 3s, but I think the difference here is Belmont’s ability to get inside and get those high-percentage attempts.

Pick: Belmont -1.5

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