College Basketball Picks

The Broncos’ recent results are skewed due to that road-heavy schedule. Western Michigan is much stronger at home and Miami (Ohio) has a number of distractions, including their NCAA fate and a look-ahead spot to a huge matchup with Toledo next week. This will be the second straight road game in four days for Miami (Ohio) and its third away tilt in four games over an 11-day period. Game models do give the nod to the RedHawks with margins sitting as low as seven points.

The Redhawks are a perfect 28-0 and are surprisingly still getting generous lines from books. They've covered in six straight games while WMU is near the bottom of the MAC standings and has gone 2-6 SU and ATS in its last eight. The Broncos have been getting routinely blown out with seven of their last eight defeats coming by 13+ points.  They sit outside the top 300 in opponent eFG% (54.4%) and will get torched by a highly-efficient Miami offense ranks fifth in the country in eFG% (59.4%) and rarely turns the ball over.

This is a letdown spot for Dayton who are coming off an upset win against first place Saint Louis at home. It's also a revenge spot for GWU who lost in Dayton last month. The Revolutionaries were inconsistent over the last month with star big man Rafael Castro (15.9 ppg, 8.9 rpg, 1.5 bpg, 64.3 FG%) sidelined by injury. Castro returned to the lineup last week and led the Revolutionaries to blowout win. He'll help them control the glass against a Dayton frontcourt that struggles to rebound. The Flyers are heavily reliant on getting to the line to generate offense since they shoot poorly inside the arc and have turnover issues. That doesn't work as well on the road where they've gone 2-5 ATS in conference play.

Both teams have elite offenses but the Wolverines have the superior defense. Michigan's only flaw on offense is turnovers but Illinois ranks dead-last in the country in opponent TO rate. The Illini are 8-5 in Quad 1 games, with foes shooting 51.5% inside the arc and 35.8% from deep in those contests. The Wolverines are 11-1 in Quad 1 games with an opponent 2PT% of 43.4% and an opponent 3PT% of 28.4%. That elite perimeter defense will frustrate the Illini who attempt threes at the eighth-highest rate in the country. Home-court advantage for Illinois isn't enough to offset Michigan's defensive edge. 

Michigan has been the more complete and efficient team all season, boasting the No. 1 scoring offense and FG% in the Big Ten. Sporting a 9-0 mark in true road games, take the Wolverines to get the job done in this conference showdown.

Duke's offense runs through attack & kicks and perimeter cuts. Virgina stops those actions as well as anyone in the country. Duke's best stuff meets Virginia's best defensive stuff. On the other end, Duke allows just 0.76 PPP on attack & kic. Two top-15 defenses and Virginia's pace make this low-scoring.