College Hoops Betting News and Notes
By Steve Merril
Covers.com
ACC
The Atlantic Coast Conference has undergone a major coaching turnover this season. Never in its 58-year history has the ACC had four new coaches in one season.
The new coaches are Brian Gregory at Georgia Tech, Mark Turgeon at Maryland, Jim Larranaga at Miami, and Mark Gottfried at North Carolina State.
Mike Krzyzewski (Duke) is the old man of the group in his 32nd season. Florida State’s Leonard Hamilton (10th year) is the only other coach in double-digits in the ACC. Roy Williams enters his ninth season at North Carolina.
BIG TEN
Michigan State has faced two of the best teams in the nation this season in a pair of ACC opponents North Carolina and Duke. The Spartans looked particularly bad against North Carolina in the Carrier Classic last Friday night.
Tom Izzo’s team lost 67-55 while shooting an abysmal 30.6 percent (22-72) from the floor and 10 percent (2-20) from 3-point land. The only reason the final score was somewhat respectable was Michigan State grabbing 19 offensive rebounds.
The biggest question for Michigan State this season will be their offense and their ability to score points consistently.
BIG 12
One of our favorite coaches is back in the Midwest. Lon Kruger left the big lights of Las Vegas to take over the slumping Oklahoma program. The Sooners have won just 27 games over the last two years (9-23 SU in conference play) after winning 30 games in 2009.
Kruger will get this team back to prominence and the Sooners could actually be a sleeper team in the mediocre Big 12 this season. He has four returning starters back and an outstanding newcomer in Romero Osby, who transferred from Mississippi State.
BIG EAST
Louisville was a possible sleeper pick to make a deep run in the NCAA tournament this season, but unfortunately for the Cardinals, they’ve been hit hard by injuries.
Talented freshman Wayne Blackshear (right shoulder) and forwards Rakeem Buckles (right knee) and Stephan Van Treese (left knee) are all out, but the biggest loss came Sunday when junior guard Mike Marra suffered a torn left ACL. Marra is now out for the rest of the season.
PAC-12
UCLA’s season is teetering on disaster right now. The Bruins knew they’d be playing their home games in the ancient L.A. Sports Arena while Pauley Pavilion was getting renovated and that was already an issue for the players.
They lost their first “home” game to Loyola Marymount 69-58 last Friday night and fell to Middle Tennessee State by 20 points Tuesday.
There were issues between coach Ben Howland and players and on Monday, Howland announced that UCLA’s best player, Reeves Nelson, would be suspended indefinitely for "conduct unbecoming a member of the UCLA basketball team."
SEC
Kentucky is the heavy favorite to win the SEC this season. The Wildcats are also the second favorite (+400) behind North Carolina (+200) to win the national championship.
Kentucky will have to do it with highly-touted freshman. The Wildcats will play four true freshman significant minutes (Anthony Davis, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Marquis Teague, and Kyle Wiltjer). But the difference this season is Kentucky also has three veterans that the young guys can also rely on in Terrence Jones, Doron Lamb, and Darius Miller.
This team is by far the most talented in the country and might very well be cutting down the nets in the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans on April 2.