College Basketball Bets
We’ve got another sizable college basketball slate with 43 games between Division I opponents and 11 more with a Division I team playing a lower-division foe in hopes of ironing out some of the kinks. As usual at this time of the year, there are a lot of big spreads on the board, as smaller athletic departments play those paycheck games in random parts of the country, creating some very interesting travel spots. Take Mississippi Valley State in Honolulu as one example.
Unlike last night, when we had a few noteworthy power-conference clashes and some blue-blood matchups, we don’t have that tonight, as we have a lot of mid-majors in action or teams like Houston, Vanderbilt, and Tennessee taking on much lesser competition. Those games can be tough to handicap because motivation matters, but also there is an enormous talent disparity on every single possession to try and account for in your process. But, that’s just what non-conference action is and will forever be.
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.
Elon Phoenix at Marshall Thundering Herd (-9.5, 153.5)
7 p.m. ET
I guess we can call this the Matthew Van Komen game. The 7-foot-4 monster in the middle transferred from Elon to Marshall, but he wasn’t the only Phoenix to leave. Far from it, actually, as Elon has a brand new starting five. Nick Dorn, Sam Sherry, TK and TJ Simpkins, and Van Komen all left the team and garnered a lot of attention in the transfer portal. Four of the five players graded 2.7 or better in Torvik’s Adjusted PORPAGATU! metric, which is Points Over Replacement Per Adjusted Game At That Usage.
In other words, four hard players to replace, yet Elon was still a team that went just 17-16 and 8-10 in CAA play. Van Komen only had a 14.1% Usage Rate, which seems wildly low for a 7-foot-4 matchup nightmare, as most of his usage was of his own accord by pulling down offensive rebounds.
Van Komen, the 6-foot-4 younger Simpkins brother, and the 6-foot-11 Sherry accounted for 346 of Elon’s 595 Close Two shot attempts and Van Komen had 31 of the team’s 67 dunks, while shooting 79% on shot attempts at the rim. I think scoring will be tough for Elon as we go forward. They had 92 points against UNC Greensboro in an overtime win in the opener, but Marshall is a much better team overall.
Furthermore, Marshall is firing away from 3 already this season, as they have wins over UMass and Toledo to start the campaign. With Van Komen’s big presence, they’re off to a 66% start on 2s and they’re shooting 37.3% on 3s with the fifth-highest Usage Rate in the country. I think second-year head coach Cornelius Jackson has the type of roster he wants now.
And because Marshall runs teams off the 3-point line (20th in 3P Rate against last season at just 32.8%), Van Komen’s imposing presence in the middle will force teams into a lot of low-percentage mid-range shots. Meanwhile, the Herd will be scoring from 3 and getting ORebs on the other side for high-percentage putbacks.
I think Marshall could be in line for a special season and their home opener is a chance to showcase it all. This is also a pace war game and I expect Marshall to push Elon in a way that makes them uncomfortable.
Pick: Marshall -9.5 (-105)
Southern Indiana Screaming Eagles at South Dakota Coyotes (-7.5, 164.5)
8 p.m. ET
The total has jumped several points for this one and that should benefit South Dakota, a team that gets to the rim at a high rate. The Coyotes started to turn the tide a bit last season – their third under head coach Eric Peterson. After two years of not being able to overcome really poor defense with an efficient enough offense, the Coyotes were third in the nation in FT Rate, second in adjusted tempo, and first in TO%.
South Dakota was 16th in shot share on Close Twos, but 279th in FG% on those types of shots. To make matters worse, they shot just 31.6% on 3s, a drop of 6% from the previous season. Isaac Bruns, who was a 55.3% shooter on 2s and over 85% from the line, only shot 31% from 3 and he’s off to a slow start this season. But, I think this matchup should be a good one for him and his teammates.
As I said, South Dakota loves to run. Through two games, Southern Indiana has five players that have played at least 61% of the minutes, so it seems like Stan Gouard doesn’t like his depth much. Ismail Habib, the second-highest usage player so far, is a career 33.6% shooter on 2s and 32.6% on 3s. Similarly, Trey Thomas from Bethune-Cookman, the highest-usage player through two games, is under 40% on 2s for his career and at 31.9% on 3s.
This looks like another terrible offense after Gouard’s team shot 45.4% on 2s to rank 343rd in the nation last season and finished 305th in eFG% offense. For good measure, they were also 324th in adjusted defensive efficiency and 331st in 3P% against at 36.7%. Maybe Gouard’s portal picks help on defense, but they sure don’t look helpful on offense.
Shot selection is a huge part of my handicapping. Southern Indiana was 324th in FG% on Close Twos last season and 216th in shot share. They were also 319th in Farther Two shot share per Torvik, which means a lot of mid-range jumpers. Those are low-percentage shots. The Screaming Eagles did shoot 35.2% on 3s last season, but their top four shooters by percentage are all gone.
South Dakota has defensive issues, but in a high-paced game with the better offense, I think they can cover this number. The Coyotes even had 38 shot attempts at the rim against Creighton in their last D-I game, so they were able to get inside against a far better team there.
Pick: South Dakota -7.5 (-105)
UT Martin Skyhawks at Bradley Braves (-15.5, 144.5)
8:30 p.m. ET
UT Martin is much closer to home for this road game than they were when they went out to Las Vegas and beat UNLV to begin the season. After a controlled scrimmage against Kentucky Christian, Jeremy Shulman’s team is back out on the road to face Bradley. Brian Wardle’s Braves dropped their opener on a neutral to St. Bonaventure and bounced back by crushing Central Michigan last time out.
I have no doubt that Wardle will end up with a solid team this season, but there is a ton of roster turnover. Jaquan Johnson and Ahmet Jonovic are the top two returnees and they played 44.5% and 36.2% of the minutes, respectively. Wardle was able to enjoy multiple seasons of Christian Davis, Duke Deen, Darius Hannah, and Zek Montgomery. He doesn’t have that luxury this season and needs to elevate bench guys and work in some transfers.
Shulman has a lot of new faces, too, including players from 10 different countries. But, this is an in-your-face defensive team that looks to score off of transition and has taken 59 3-pointers against 65 2-pointers so far this season in two games. Bradley is a really good team in the offensive half-court, especially in the Missouri Valley, where pressure defense isn’t really a thing. The Skyhawks could make them very uncomfortable and coaches are worried less about preparing for the next opponent and more about figuring out what works and what doesn’t with their own teams.
That’s probably one of the reasons why UT Martin found success against UNLV, turning the new-look Rebels over 22 times in that game. Bradley is a good defense, but, again, not an aggressive one. I do think Wardle is an excellent coach, but the frenetic pace and limited space in this one makes it tough for me to envision Bradley running away with this game.
Shulman should improve in Year 2 as a Division I head coach and he’s got a lot of size and long-limbed players on his roster to contest shots and win the turnover battle.
Pick: UT Martin +15.5 (-112)
