Looking for sports betting action this weekend? Your curated list of tips, analytics and humor, every Saturday at 10am Eastern.
College basketball player prop – Dr. Nick Giffen runs a college basketball player model at The Action Network. Today, he likes a rebounding prop in Drake vs Texas Tech.
Nick notes that Drake does not allow opponents many rebounds for a number of reasons.
- They rebound the ball well, as Drake is 10th in his adjusted rebound percentage.
- They get to the line on offense and foul on defense.
- They play at a slow pace (dead last in KenPom’s adjusted tempo).
For these reasons, Nick sees value in Texas Tech’s Kerwin Walton under 1.5 rebounds, +115 at BetMGM. Follow Dr. Nick for all his quantitative insights into college basketball, the NFL and motor sports.
McNeese State vs Purdue – Analytics based on points makes Purdue the favorite in this game (5.0 by the team rankings at The Power Rank, 6 by KenPom.com). Early this morning, the markets had Purdue -5.5.
However, my best member predictions also use a market component as well (closing point spreads). This aspect of the model pushes down a team like McNeese State. The model has also downgraded Purdue late in the season as they have lost six of their last nine games.
Despite this recent history, my member numbers like Purdue by 7.7 points. The market has moved from Purdue -5.5 to -6.5, but I’d still lean Purdue at this number. Members of The Power Rank get access to these predictions the day before the game, so Sunday’s predictions are up now.
BYU vs Wisconsin – BYU handled VCU on Friday by a 80-71 score. Now, the 6 seed BYU faces the 3 seed Wisconsin, and my member numbers actually favor the lower seed (BYU by 0.3 points at a neutral site).
John Tonje has been excellent for a Wisconsin team that has overachieved this season. However, Edward Egros broke down multiple reasons to like Brigham Young as as underseeded team in an episode of Bracket Wisdom.
Underseeded teams – Evan Miyakawa compares his player based team ratings to seed to make a nice visual of underseeded teams. This list starts with the three best teams in the tournament (Duke, Florida and Houston).
However, the list gets more interesting for lower seeds, as his numbers like Maryland and Arizona. My member numbers agree (4 seeds should be 13th to 16th in the nation):
- 4 seed Maryland (11th in The Power Rank), predicted to beat Colorado State by 7.3 points.
- 4 seed Arizona (9th in The Power Rank), predicted to beat Oregon by 5.5 points.
These teams could feature in some incredible Sweet Sixteen games, as Maryland would face Florida while Arizona would get Duke.
Basketball humor – Jason Sudeikis, who is working on the 4th season of Ted Lasso, made this awesome Roundball Rock skit back in his SNL days. Warning, you won’t get this song out of your head all weekend.
The entire Roundball Rock sketch is even funnier, so worth 5 minutes of your time.
Smarter sports betting in less than 5 minutes
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