College Basketball Handicapping Articles

NCAA Tournament Futures: Long Shots To Watch
by Richard Gardner | Bodog Sportsbook Manager - 2/25/2011

Why am I mentioning all this? Well, many experts are predicting that 2011 might be the year for an unheralded team to break the string of championships for top seeds. The reason? While there are a number of very good teams out there, there might not be a truly great team, and that could make for a wide-open tournament.

2011 Final Four Predictions
by T.O. Whenham - 2/21/2011

That means one big thing - now is the perfect time to make some Final Four predictions. And predictions about the road to the Final Four as well. Here are eight things that I feel confident about right now. Of course, I’m even more confident that several of these predictions will be embarrassingly lousy by the time thee tournament rolls around. Without further ado:

College Basketball Picks: UConn at Louisville Odds and Predictions
by Alan Matthews - 2/18/2011

I would like to argue that tonight’s Big East matchup between Top-16 teams UConn and Louisville carries some special significance, but it probably really doesn’t. Well, a potential Top-4 seed for the Big East Tournament carries some weight in terms of byes, but other than that both of these teams are headed to the Big Dance no matter what happens from here on out.

College Basketball Handicapping: Don’t Overreact to Rare Losses
by T.O. Whenham - 2/18/2011

I have a serious pet peeve when it comes to college basketball -- how the polls and the public react to a single loss by a top-ranked team. We’ve seen it twice in just over a month, and it’s ridiculous in both cases. First, Duke was the undefeated, unanimous No. 1 team in the country, but one road losses in a very hostile Florida State environment and they were dropped down to fourth place.

College Basketball Handicapping: Teams That Could Shine in March Madness
by T.O. Whenham - 2/17/2011

The postseason in college basketball is all about surprises -- teams that perform much better than the public expects them to. Sometimes those teams come from nowhere to become media darlings. More often, though, they are teams that had a lot of things working for them and looked like they were on the right path. These surprise teams can take many forms -- they can be strong second-level contenders in major conferences, or teams that toil in obscure conferences away from the public radar.

Bracketology: NCAA Tournament Projections and Bubble Watch
by Robert Ferringo - 2/16/2011

All I know is this: 68 is a whole lotta teams. For those of you that have been kicking it with the Tea Party/mountain folk in the hills of Tennessee over the last few months, I am here to remind you that the NCAA Tournament has actually expanded this year. The Big Dance will now feature 68 teams, with four at-large squads taking on four automatic qualifiers in a play-in game on the Tuesday before the actual 64-team tournament begins on Thursday.

College Basketball Bracket Buster Weekend Preview
by Robert Ferringo - 2/15/2011

I've analyzed the last six years of the mid-February mid-major hoops orgy known as Bracket Buster Weekend to see if I could establish any useful betting angles or trends. Instead of working over every single "official" Bracket Buster game I squared my focus on the ones that featuring the mid-major conferences that were routinely wagered upon. That includes the Ohio Valley, Big West, Horizon, Missouri Valley, Metro Atlantic, Mid-American, Colonial, and Western Athletic. These are the key players and they constitute the primary games in the Bracket Buster schedule.

College Basketball Picks: Michigan State at Ohio State Odds Predictions
by Alan Matthews - 2/15/2011

Back when the college basketball season started, tonight’s Big Ten game between Michigan State and Ohio State was circled by many fans as the likely game of the year between the two top contenders in the conference and two Top-10 teams. Well, Ohio State has kept up its end of the bargain, but the Spartans are uncharacteristically struggling under Coach Tom Izzo and are squarely on the NCAA Tournament bubble after beginning the season at No. 2 in the nation.

College Basketball Picks: Big Monday Odds and Predictions
by Nicholas Tolomeo - 2/14/2011

The Carrier Dome has been a house of horrors for West Virginia and Big Monday has not been so kind either. West Virginia is 1-4 in its last four Big Monday games and just last week the Mountaineers fell to rival Pitt, 71-66, in Morgantown. West Virginia sure wishes their next Big Monday showdown this week would be in Morgantown and not Syracuse’s Carrier Dome. The Orange have won their last six in a row against West Virginia in the Carrier Dome.

College Basketball Picks: Pitt at Villanova Odds and Betting Predictions
by Darin Zank - 2/12/2011

Big East basketball has already had a crazy year full of big games matching not just contenders for the conference crown, but for more coveted prizes come March. And Saturday night gives us another chance for a big-time Big East barnburner, as the Pitt Panthers, ranked No. 4 in the most recent AP poll, visit Philly to take on the 9th-ranked Villanova Wildcats within the cozy confines of The Pavilion (9 p.m. EST, ESPN).

College Basketball Picks: Ohio State at Wisconsin Odds and Predictions
by Alan Matthews - 2/11/2011

The University of Michigan is basically a phrase banned from being uttered in Columbus, Ohio. There is no doubt that the maize and blue are the most-hated rivals of Ohio State, no matter the sport. However, Buckeyes fans might have to inch the University of Wisconsin a little closer to Michigan on the ladder of vitriol if the Badgers can beat OSU on Saturday in Madison.

Best and Worst Against the College Basketball Odds
by T.O. Whenham - 2/10/2011

We’re getting into the stretch drive of the college basketball season. That means that fans of the sport are getting more and more excited about the postseason with every passing day. It also means that teams have played enough games that we now have a very good sense of which teams are kind to bettors, and which ones burn betting money recklessly. Here’s a look at the studs and duds against the college basketball odds to this point:

College Basketball Picks: North Carolina at Duke Odds and Predictions
by Alan Matthews - 2/9/2011

It’s rather fitting that just after the Super Bowl, college basketball fans get treated to the Super Bowl of college basketball’s regular season (and ESPN/Dick Vitale hype it as such): the North Carolina-Duke rivalry resumes on Wednesday night. A few weeks ago, this looked like a giant mismatch as the Heels were stuck in the mud much like last season, but they are rolling and entered the coaches’ poll at No. 21 this week after falling out in late November. The Blue Devils are No. 5 in that poll and lead UNC by a half-game atop the ACC.

College Basketball Picks: Big Monday Odds and Predictions
by Nicholas Tolomeo - 2/7/2011

The Backyard Brawl rivalry gets plenty of attention come football season, but the hardwood version has been just as competitive over the course of the past decade. Just like any other good rivalry, rankings and records mean very little -- especially when the team with the higher ranking and better record is on the road. They say home-court advantage can be worth nearly four points in college basketball, and in the Backyard Brawl it may be worth even more.

College Basketball Betting: One Chaotic Season
by T.O. Whenham - 2/3/2011

College basketball is in total chaos right now. Part of what makes the sport so great is that there is always chaos, but this year is way beyond normal. Last weekend is a perfect example -- there were 20 games featuring at least one ranked team over the weekend, and the college basketball point spread was covered in 14 of those games by the unranked team or the lower ranked team if both teams were ranked. Eleven of those lesser teams won outright, so betting the moneyline on all the underdogs would have been wildly profitable.

College Basketball Picks: Big Monday Odds and Predictions
by Nicholas Tolomeo - 1/31/2011

Louisville has not made things easy on itself lately. Three of its last four wins have been by one point. Things will not be any easier for Louisville when it travels to our nation’s capital to take on Georgetown on Big Monday. Louisville needed double overtime to get past Connecticut on Saturday and last second baskets to defeat West Virginia and Marquette in the past two weeks.

College Basketball Picks: Purdue at Ohio State Odds and Predictions
by Alan Matthews - 1/25/2011

We are down to two unbeaten teams left in college basketball – you may recall I mostly called that Texas upset of Kansas on Saturday – with Ohio State and San Diego State. And in the span of 24 hours or so we could have no undefeated teams left with the Buckeyes and Aztecs facing Top 15-ranked conference foes on Tuesday and Wednesday, respectively. Here we look at No. 12 Purdue vs. No. 1 Ohio State tonight in Columbus.

College Basketball Picks: Big Monday Odds and Predictions
by Nicholas Tolomeo - 1/24/2011

If not for a head-scratching loss in Pittsburgh to a bipolar Tennessee squad, we would be talking about Pitt as the undisputed No. 1 team in the land. Instead they have to settle for being the No. 4 team in the country and cream of the crop in the Big East, the best basketball conference in the country.

College Basketball Picks: Texas at Kansas Odds and Predictions
by Alan Matthews - 1/21/2011

Saturday is easily the best day of the season thus far in college basketball. How good? There are five games matching Top 25 teams on the day, and for this story I didn’t even go with No. 1 Ohio State at No. 22 Illinois, in which the Buckeyes could easily suffer their first loss. I also passed on No. 7 Villanova at No. 3 Syracuse even though both teams could suffer a second straight loss to a Big East Top 10 foe, and in which the Orange could set an NCAA record for attendance in an on-campus game. Nope, the game of the day is No. 11 Texas at No. 2 Kansas because of the No. 70.

College Basketball Odds: Under-the-Radar Teams With Value
by T.O. Whenham - 1/20/2011

Most of the media coverage -- and therefore the public attention -- in college basketball is focused on the big-name teams. That means that people only really care about the teams that are ranked, those with long histories of success, and the teams that have the big wins and flashy players that the media loves. Those teams are what you hear about most, but often times the most attractive betting teams are ones that people aren’t paying any attention to at all.