Chip's Picks (2 Live)
Missouri is 4-0 against the spread as a home underdog in SEC play this season. ...
Iowa is averaging 70.8 points per game against Big Ten opponents, the result of middling efficiency (9th in the conference) and an unhurried tempo, which has the Hawkeyes slotted at No. 357 of 365 Division I teams. That sets a base line for this game, which is both decidedly not against the average Big Ten defense and also probably a bad matchup for the Hawkeyes. Michigan is an elite two-point defense thanks to its trio of stellar bigs, and while Iowa is going to try and pick-and-roll its way to Bennett Stirtz-fueled buckets I’m not sure he’s getting enough firepower from the supporting cast to carve up the Wolverines efficiently.
Pittsburgh certainly enjoyed its trip back to the East Coast after closing out the Bay Area double with an upset win against Cal. Now the question is whether we see a jet-lagged letdown against a Florida State team that’s 4-0 in its last four and 5-3 overall in ACC road games this season. It’s no surprise to see teams start to play better basketball late in Year 1 of a new hire, and Luke Loucks’ team has been mostly trending in the right direction after an 0-5 start to conference play. We have seen teams really struggle in that first return game after the ACC’s Bay Area back-to-back over the last two seasons, and Florida State’s quality validates a play in this spot.
There should be some real concern about SMU right now, because the Mustangs undid some good work with last week’s trip to the Bay Area to face Cal and Stanford. Saturday’s 20-point loss at Stanford left SMU 0-2 on the trip and now welcome in a Miami team that had as many ACC wins (6) in the month of February as anyone not named Duke. SMU, on the other hand, went 4-4 in that same stretch and didn’t provide too much in terms of defensive resistance. Miami plays with a much thinner margin against high-end shooting teams, but whether SMU is in rhythm or not after the West Coast road trip is something to question.
Oregon is 4-14 in Big Ten play but 3-2 in its last five games. Nate Bittle and Kwame Evans make for a dynamic duo down low who are difficult in their own right to stop but also won’t be thrown off by Illinois’ size. It’s a tricky spot for the Fighting Illini coming off the deflating defeat last Friday night, because the Wolverines were quite possibly the last top-50 opponent the team will face until the quarterfinals of the Big Ten tournament. Brad Underwood’s team might be in a spot to take a breath and reset, while the Ducks are playing with house money and a bit more confidence from recent success.
Texas Tech’s last three games have graded out as some of the best offensive performances of Big 12 play, but that does not mean the team is better without JT Toppin. Christian Anderson has been a superhero and there's been some lights-out shooting by the whole team, but if there’s any regression or cooling it opens the door for TCU to become a chaos team once again. The Frogs’ variance is astounding, capable of beating Iowa State and Florida and yet also losing by double-digits to Colorado. TCU will need easy points off turnovers and at the free throw line to keep the game competitive. But with a wide range of outcomes possible here I’ll take the points with the HypnoToads as underdogs.
UCF cannot afford to take this game lightly as the Knights are on the right side of the bubble, but not clearly in the field, and this game could end up being a Quad 3 loss with Oklahoma State falling outside the top 75 in the NET. It is also just the second game the Pokes have had to play without arguably its best offensive player in 6-10 big man Parsa Fallah, who suffered a torn ACL in a win against West Virginia last week. The first game without Fallah was a 23-point loss at Cincinnati over the weekend, and with UCF’s narrow margin and urgency to bounce back I think the Knights could drop the hammer on an under-manned squad.
Ever since getting blasted by Florida back on Jan. 13, Oklahoma has strung together some fairly respectable performances at home. The Sooners are only 2-4 in that stretch, but did lead at halftime in eventual losses to Texas, Arkansas and Alabama. These hot starts are where we find a potential angle against a Missouri team that has won six of its last eight and flipped its status from Dayton-bound to dangerous SEC Tournament threat. With a rematch against Arkansas in Columbia coming up on Saturday there is some lookahead potential as well, so while the Sooners can’t be trusted for 40 I’ll take the trend of those hot starts in Norman as a reason to buy in for 20 minutes.
The Tigers have steadied the ship, it seems, after a four-game losing streak and now face North Carolina with double-bye ACC Tournament implications. With Senior Night festivities coming for Seth Trimble, I’m expecting a high-energy game from the Tar Heels and if recent series history is any indication Clemson has been willing to speed up its game to match North Carolina’s pace. The five-game sample set between Hubert Davis and Brad Brownell is 3-2 in the Tar Heels' favor as Clemson has won the last two, but the real key is that four of those five games have gotten to 150 points or more and the average across the set is 149.2 points per game.
I think Alabama might be a bad matchup for Georgia, especially if this is a track meet. The Bulldogs’ blistering tempo has cooled off in SEC play, but it’s still a group that’s getting a good portion of production from transition buckets and playing a defensive style that will give them up as well. Alabama ties its shoes and puts up 90 in these kind of back-and-forth showdowns, even as it falls in a tricky schedule spot between stealing the win at Tennessee and wrapping the regular season against Auburn. If the game plays out as the spread suggests and it's a coin-flip contest late, then I think Alabama has an edge with more high-end playmakers to deliver in clutch situations.
Duke has a length and athleticism advantage in this game that should show up on both ends of the floor but will be particularly impactful at helping the Blue Devils get extra possessions with offensive rebounds. NC State is dealing with injuries in the frontcourt and the Blue Devils rate as the No. 1 offensive rebounding team in ACC play, grabbing 36.5% of their opponents' missed shots. The Wolfpack have also been trending in the wrong direction on the defensive side of the ball, logging three of their least-efficient performances in the last five games.
Gonzaga did a good job of holding Saint Mary's to one of least efficient offensive outings of the season in an 8-point Zags win back on Jan. 31. But the question here is whether the same can be expected in Moraga, where the building will be buzzing for SMC's chances to clinch a share of the WCC title before Gonzaga bolts for the Pac-12. Randy Bennett has not been swept by Gonzaga in the regular season since 2020-21, and the Gaels have earned at least a share of the last three conference titles. This has been one of the great late-night rivalries of the modern era, so expecting a classic I love the value of the home dog.
The ability of Arkansas guard Darius Acuff to create offense against Florida's backcourt should be able to keep Arkansas in the game enough to cat-and-mouse this game script up into the 80s. Florida's advantage on the boards is one reason we see the spread so heavily in the Gators favor, but that also creates more possessions and scoring opportunities for the total.
Arizona seems to be getting healthier, not only having Koa Peat potentially available after injury but also battling some illness through the mid-week win at Baylor. Kansas, of course, has seen a lot more full-game participation from Darryn Peterson, which should help some of the consistency and continuity concerns for the Jayhawks offense. But this truly comes down to Bill Self and Tommy Lloyd, as the three matchups between these two coaches as Big 12 foes are 3-0 to the over with an average total of 161.3 points in those games. There are a lot of game scripts that get us up to 150, whether it's a back-and-forth game or a comfortable Arizona win, so I like the total in this big-stage Big 12 battle.