College Basketball Bets
We have 66 games on the college basketball card for Tuesday. I would make a Route 66 joke, but the schedule includes games in Maui, the Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Cancun, and several tournaments in Florida. So, while we have college hoops across the U.S., we also have some games outside of the continental 48 and in states that Route 66 doesn’t run through.
What we do have is a really wide range of action. And we have basketball all day from 11 a.m. ET to well past Midnight ET. These games are usually good measuring sticks for teams and also become ammo for the seeding process come March Madness, so even though they seem like random matchups, they are going to be very important down the line.
For more college basketball best bets today, check out Greg Peterson’s daily article.
As always, I want to give a shout-out to Bart Torvik (BartTorvik.com), Erik Haslam (Haslametrics.com), and KenPom, as they provide a lot of great data. This season, we’ve also connected with CBBAnalytics.com to access their data and I’ll be working that into my article. Use promo code VSIN for $30 off at CBB Analytics and find your betting edge.
This article will run Monday-Saturday. Lines will be from DraftKings, as they are widely available to readers. Shop around for the best prices.
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 (DraftKings) and Circa CBB Betting Splits a look for these or any other college basketball games today have your interest.
Odds from DraftKings Sportsbook at time of publish.
Tennessee State Tigers at UNC Asheville Bulldogs (-6.5, 163.5)
7 p.m. ET
OVC vs. Big South here, as Tennessee State takes on UNC Asheville. These are two teams still trying to figure everything out this season, as the Tigers have a new head coach and the Bulldogs are working through the losses of Josh Banks and Fletcher Abee. Teams seem to have adjusted defensively already to the losses of Banks and Abee, as top scorer and big man Toyaz Solomon hasn’t been able to get to the rim with the same frequency he did last season.
Banks (34.8%) and Abee (42.6%) were easily the team’s two best 3-point shooters. Without them, the rest of the team was just 74-of-257 (28.8%). Newcomer Justin Wright is 10-of-17 so far, but he only shot 31.4% last season at Loyola Marymount. He was a 42% shooter over two seasons at NC Central, so maybe it’s in there, but he also only had 131 3-point attempts over three seasons. I don’t think he can sustain this pace with his current 3P Rate.
Also, while sitting second on the team in Usage Rate at 26.9%, he has a 27.5% TO%. I don’t think there’s any chance he stays this valuable of a player. Furthermore, UNCA is shooting 50% on mid-range jumpers. That strikes me as unsustainable as well.
Tennessee State is stepping back in class in a big way here, as they’ve played Belmont, Western Kentucky, and Tennessee thus far. First-year head coach Nolan Smith definitely needs to find some scoring, but he didn’t have much time in the summer to work with his team. This is a group that finished over .500 last season at 17-16 and kept around three starters and 10 returnees, even with the coaching change over the summer.
The Tigers want to play fast, a tough thing against a high-efficiency offense like Belmont and a team simply more talented on both ends like Tennessee. Western Kentucky had 44 shot attempts at the rim compared to 16 for Tennessee State and they only lost that game by 13. It should have been way more lopsided than that, but they draw a UNC Asheville team that hasn’t gotten to the rim a lot this season.
The Bulldogs have also allowed 1.109 (Wichita State), 1.156 (GA Southern), .988 (Lipscomb), and 1.243 (Western Carolina) points per possession, so I could see Tennessee State finding more points and better shot selection here.
Pick: Tennessee State +6.5 (-105)
Southeast Missouri State Redhawks vs. Cal Poly Mustangs (-1.5, 170.5)
8 p.m. ET
A high-scoring affair is expected here in Flagstaff, where Cal Poly takes on Southeast Missouri State. I think there are a few advantages here for the Redhawks in this one. First, Cal Poly played yesterday, which creates a few good advantages in and of itself. For those who don’t know, Flagstaff is about 7,100 feet in elevation, so one of the highest in college basketball.
The Mustangs lost 93-87 to Northern Arizona yesterday in what was their fourth straight game in elevation after playing at Colorado State, Montana, Utah, and then last night’s game. Now they’ll play a back-to-back in those conditions as a team that wants to play fast and takes a ton of 3s. They’re inherently not good on defense, allowing D-I opponents to shoot 57.3% on 2s thus far, and the legs may not be there for long jumpers or defensive possessions.
Second, with playing yesterday, SEMO State head coach Brad Korn got to take a look at the Mustangs and figure out how they play and what to expect. His team did not play yesterday and they haven’t played in a week since losing to Iowa. The numbers for SEMO State look really bad, but they’ve faced four very efficient offensive teams in Saint Louis, Missouri, St. Thomas, and Iowa. To their credit, they had 1.086 PPP against Missouri and 1.026 against Iowa, so they found ways to score and were actually a combined 40-for-67 on 2s against the Tigers and Hawkeyes.
I think Korn is a really good head coach. The Redhawks had a transitional year in 2024 after losing a big chunk of an NCAA Tournament team in 2022-23. Last season, they won the OVC regular season and should have gone to the NIT, but the tournament changed the rules to try and attract bigger-name programs.
Seeing Cal Poly is a good thing. Like I’ve said before, coaches are more worried about making sure that their systems are in place as opposed to scouting opponents heavily. It is a rare opportunity for Korn that he saw a team first-hand instead of trying to watch video, so he can help his team better prepare against what could be a fatigued opponent because his Redhawks have no issue playing with pace themselves.
Pick: Southeast Missouri State +1.5 (-110)
Portland State Vikings (-1.5, 146.5) at Utah Tech Trailblazers
9 p.m. ET
We’ll see this matchup more next year, as Utah Tech will join Portland State in the Big Sky Conference. Perhaps Vikings head coach Jase Coburn will try to use this game as a rude awakening for the Trailblazers, who are currently in the WAC.
Utah Tech’s body of work has been really unimpressive thus far. They lost to Manhattan in Honolulu and followed it up by needing two overtimes to beat a Mississippi Valley State team that won three games last season and 13 games total over the last five seasons. They actually hung in there with Hawaii, but the Rainbow Warriors were 1-of-14 from 3, so that wasn’t a great shooting effort from them.
Utah Tech is really selling out to defend the 3-point line. They’ve only allowed a 29.2% 3P% with a 31.1% 3P Rate against. I would expect Portland State, a team who shares the ball effectively, to be able to put a dent in those numbers. So far over three D-I games, the Vikings are shooting 43.8% from deep. That won’t continue, but they’re also a team shooting 64% on 2-pointers at the rim, led by 6-foot-10 Tre-Vaughn Minott.
Portland State is not a deep team at all, at least not so far, but their top four players have all been really good. Three of them are holdovers from last season, while Utah Tech lost their top three scorers from last season. So far this season, Utah Tech has allowed a 44.6% shot share on Close Twos and opponents have converted at a 63.6% rate. Selling out to defend the 3 has some ramifications. A well-coached team like Portland State should be able to take advantage.
Pick: Portland State -1.5 (-112)
