Ear to the hardwood: College hoops betting notes & quotes
By Tedddy Covers
In this week’s edition of College Hoops Notes & Quotes, I’ll look at a trio of under-the-radar teams, well outside the national spotlight. Two of these teams are pointspread juggernauts in 2011. The third has been an ATS disaster area. Will the current trends continue? Read on to find out.
Flyers flying under the radar
Like so many college basketball teams at this time of the year, Dayton’s pointspread value is still being affected by things that happened months ago. The Flyers got blown out at Cincinnati just after Thanksgiving, losing 68-34. They followed that loss with a home loss to East Tennessee State. The betting markets haven’t forgiven them for either loss, but the Flyers have gotten much better. That’s why Dayton is 8-2 ATS in its last 10 games, with both ATS losses coming in the role of a favorite.
In their preferred role (as road underdogs in hostile environments against quality foes), Brian Gregory’s squad has been money in the bank. The Flyers covered the spread in a SU win at Seton Hall as 8-point dogs. They covered at Old Dominion as 11.5-point pups, losing by three points. At Ole Miss, catching 6.5 points, Dayton won outright in overtime. The Flyers won outright at St Louis as short dogs and lost by only five points at Xavier last weekend in another wire-to-wire spread cover.
The betting markets don’t tend to like freshmen point guards, particularly on the highway. But Dayton has an emerging talent at the point in Juwan Staten, one of the Top 15 recruits in the country at his position this past offseason.
“He played well. I asked him to get on the glass for us, and he got three defensive rebounds. And he can become a really quality defender. And I thought he was in control offensively,” head coach Brian Gregory said of his star guard after last Saturday’s tight loss at Xavier.
With a pair of senior starters up front in Chris Wright and Devin Searcy and four juniors getting major minutes as well, the Flyers have the experience to compensate for their youth at the point guard position. Dayton wins with defense and rebounding - two commodities not likely to be overvalued by the betting markets anytime soon.
Hilltoppers falling off a cliff
Western Kentucky has completely fallen apart over the last month, turning the preseason Sun Belt favorite into a bet-against squad at every reasonable opportunity. The Hilltoppers have lost six straight and nine of their last eleven. Head coach Ken McDonald seems to have no answers.
They just lost SU by 14 points against a Troy squad that entered the game with a 2-13 SU mark, falling into last place with the defeat. They followed that clunker with a home loss to Florida Atlantic, a game they trailed by 14 points eight minutes into the contest, never enjoying a lead at any point.
Prior to that, Western Kentucky suffered its first-ever loss at home to Denver, falling SU as 9-point chalk. In fact, the Hilltoppers have a losing SU record at home this year which is a rarity for a team that came within one second of the Sweet 16 two years ago in McDonald’s first season on the job.
When a program falls hard and fast, like Western Kentucky’s has, the betting markets struggle to adjust quickly enough. This team lacks any semblance of poise and confidence. McDonald used all the coaching tricks prior to the Troy game, like the old classic move of taking his players names of their jerseys.
“Our mindset is just not there. We don’t have enough to keep our defensive mindset for a full game,” McDonald told reporters. “We’ve done it in spurts, but not for a whole game. Every good Hilltopper team over the years has had a team that’s hustled on the defensive end. We’ve tried to push every button we can to get everyone to go. You get the sense that we don’t play as a team.”
“Once we face adversity, we just all fall apart,” said senior forward Steffphon Pettigrew. “We’ve got to find it within ourselves to put two halves together and come together as a team. With all this talent, there has to be character that goes with it. You can have all the talent in the world, but if you don’t have character, you don’t have much. And we don’t have that right now.”
Truly Ram tough
If you’re looking for an undervalued commodity in the Mountain West, you’ve found it. Colorado State has been a second-tier team (at best) in this conference for the better part of the last decade. This year, however, the Rams are legitimate competitors but the betting markets have yet to offer much respect.
The numbers don’t lie. Colorado State is 8-1 ATS in its last nine games.
Colorado State has been at its best ATS on the highway. The Rams have covered road games all year long, winning outright at Denver, San Francisco and Dominican, taking Colorado to overtime and covering the spread in surprisingly competitive defeats at Kansas and New Mexico. The Rams beat Southern Miss, Ole Miss and Appalachian State to win their Christmas tournament in Cancun.
This team is mentally resilient and physically tough, as we saw clearly when dominated mighty UNLV with a wire-to-wire road win as 13-point underdogs Wednesday night.
“I think we can beat any team, anywhere on any night,” head coach Tim Miles told the media.
Miles talked about the difference between last year’s team that lost by 31 points in Las Vegas and this year’s team. UNLV head coach Lon Kruger agreed, and that was before the Rams won SU at the Thomas and Mack center.
“It's a different club right now”, Kruger said. “Tim has done a fantastic job. They have gotten better each year, and now, probably for the first time, he feels like he's got his guys in there and they're playing hard and playing well.”
Colorado State is a senior laden team. Senior forwards Andy Ogide and Travis Franklin, senior guard Adam Nigon, Iowa State transfer Wes Eikmeier and star sophomore Dorian Green make up the starting five and there’s solid depth behind that unit. The betting markets haven’t seemed to take notice just yet, offering continued value with the Rams moving forward.