College basketball action on Friday night features a couple of Big East showdowns, including a contest between the Xavier Musketeers and Georgetown Hoyas.
The Hoyas have lost three of their last four games and will look to get their season on track against the Musketeers, who have won four in a row. College basketball betting lines opened with Xavier as an 11.5-point road favorite for this contest with the Over/Under at 157.
Here are my best free Xavier vs. Georgetown college basketball picks and predictions for December 16.
Xavier vs Georgetown best odds
Xavier vs Georgetown picks and predictions
This seems like a lot of points to spot an unranked team on the road in a conference rivalry but besides having home-court advantage, there's no reason to even consider the Hoyas here.
The Musketeers might be unranked but they received 26 points in the latest AP Top 25 poll, while the Hoyas can consider themselves lucky if they don't finish the season at the bottom of the Big East.
Xavier has played the 29th toughest schedule in the country, according to ESPN, and has still gone a respectable 8-3. All three of those defeats were highly competitive contests against Top-15 schools in Duke, Indiana, and Gonzaga.
Meanwhile, the Hoyas are 5-6 despite ranking just 251st in strength of schedule. Georgetown has won just three of its last nine games and is fresh off an 83-64 loss to Syracuse. The most embarrassing defeats during that recent stretch included a 4-point home loss to the American Eagles of the Patriot League and an 18-point beatdown on neutral ground to Loyola-Marymount.
The Hoyas have shown some improvement on offense from last season but they look just as awful on the other end of the floor where they rank 238th in adjusted defensive efficiency according to KenPom.
That's bad news against a Xavier squad that is 11th in adjusted offensive efficiency and likes to push the tempo, giving it plenty of possessions. I'm laying the points with the road favorites.
My best bet: Xavier -10.5 (-110 at bet365)
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Xavier vs Georgetown spread analysis
Xavier has won four games in a row and is fresh off a 79-59 home victory against the Southern Jaguars.
The Musketeers have gotten off to a promising 8-3 start to the season, with head coach Sean Miller trying to get the program back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2018. They went just 8-11 in conference play last season and fired Travis Steele, replacing him with Miller, who had previously coached at the school from 2005-2009 with plenty of success.
The Musketeers have benefitted from continuity by returning three of their Top 4 leading scorers from last year, along with sixth-man Adam Kunkel. Xavier's best player has been transfer guard Souley Boum, who is averaging 17 points per game on 54/51/87 shooting splits while adding 4.2 assists per game.
Georgetown is in the completely opposite position, after saying goodbye to virtually every rotation player from last year. That's probably a good thing, with the Hoyas coming off the worst season in program history and going a pathetic 0-19 against Big East foes.
That personnel turnover hasn't resulted in much improvement so far, with the Hoyas going just 3-6 SU and ATS in their last nine games despite facing a weak schedule. Georgetown has made strides offensively with transfer guards Primo Spears, Brandon Murray, and Jay Heath all averaging more than 14 ppg while shooting at least 43% from the floor.
However, the Hoyas have been brutal on the other end of the floor, where they sit outside the Top 300 in opponent 3-pointers made per game (9.1) and rank 290th in defensive rebounding rate. Those are areas that could be exploited by a Musketeers team that shoots a sizzling 40.8% from long range and does an excellent job cleaning the glass.
Xavier vs Georgetown Over/Under analysis
The total has ticked down to 155.5 from its opening number of 157 but it's easy to see why oddsmakers set this number so high.
The Musketeers have an average length of possession of 15.5 seconds, the 19th-lowest number in the country. That fast tempo combined with an effective field goal percentage of 57% (tied for eighth-best in the country) has led to some high-scoring performances from this offense.
Xavier is averaging 84.4 ppg in its last five games and has all five starters averaging double-digits in points. It's also second in the country with 20.5 assists per game and that ball movement and scoring depth makes it very tough for any school to stop, let alone the defensively inept Hoyas.
That said, the Hoyas have been capable of putting points on the board thanks to Spears (17.2 ppg, 4.9 apg) and Murray (15.1 ppg, 4.0 apg). They are also relatively quick when they have the ball ranking 77th in the country with an average of 16.4 seconds per offensive possession.
Xavier vs Georgetown betting trend to know
The Hoyas are 5-12 ATS in their last 17 home games. Find more College basketball betting trends for Xavier vs. Georgetown.
Xavier vs Georgetown game info
| Location: | Capital One Arena, Washington, DC |
| Date: | Friday, December 16, 2022 |
| Tip-off: | 6:30 p.m. ET |
| TV: | FS1 |
