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2020

NCAAB 2/17

comment : Off

No plays for me yesterday but off a 10-6-1 Saturday and hoping some of that mini momentum carries into the new week. As always not much to work with on the Monday slate but I do think I’ve found a little bit of a value. Here’s what I’m going with….

Notre Dame (-3.5): I make this line Notre Dame -6.5 so needless to say I disagree with this opener and the early movement that pushed it from 4 to 3.5. At 10-15 overall and 3-11 North Carolina has plenty of problems but the biggest is offensively. Most of that falls on the shoulders of Cole Anthony. Yes he’s most likely a 1 and done college guy and then a lottery NBA pick but the truth is he’s having a horrible season. His usage rates, shot rates, etc are all through the roof which is fine except for the minor detail that he’s terribly inefficient. He’s shooting 35% from the field, 31% from 3 point land, and on top of that turning the ball over a ton. With a guy like that dominating the ball so much it’s no wonder their offensive numbers as a team are putrid. The Heels are 331st in effective FG%, 336th from 3 point land, 290th in 2 point %, 312th in FT%, etc, etc. Simply put they just can’t shoot whatsoever. On the other end Notre Dame does struggle defensively but their offense is still plenty respectable. They are 36th in adjusted offensive efficiency and that’s due in large part to the 2nd best turnover rate in the nation. Most of their damage is done from 3 where they score 38.8% of their points, that’s 19th highest in the nation. Gibbs and Goodwin are excellent 3 point shooters while Hubb, Mooney and Pflueger are capable of being dangerous from out there too. The Heels are a bit below average defending the 3 point line so that figures to be area where the Irish have some success. Ultimately I think the Irish offense is able to get theirs and as long as the crazy inefficient Anthony is leading UNC it’s tough to trust that offense at all. I see Notre Dame winning something like 78-70.

Bethune Cookman/Delaware State Ov 160.5: Get your track shoes on for this one. I’ll concede we don’t have good offenses here but we do have are two horrid defenses and what should be an insane pace. On the season Bethune Cookman is 9th in the nation in adjusted tempo and Delaware State is even faster than that at 5th. If that isn’t enough both teams have actually ramped things up even more in conference play. On the season Bethune Cookman is at 74.2 possessions per game but in conference play that’s all the way up to 77.1. Same story for Delaware State who is at 74.8 possessions per game on the season, but 76.1 in conference play. Both teams are going to want to run and neither is going to anything to offer resistance to the other. Defensively Delaware State is 347th in the nation in adjusted defensive efficiency, and at 294th Bethune Cookman isn’t much better. Now as I said in the open neither offense is any good but with this many possessions and defense this bad it shouldn’t matter. Not that the Delaware State defense has any strengths but inside is clearly their biggest weakness. They allow opponents to shoot 56.3% from 2 which is 347th in the nation, and they only block 5.6% of shots which is 318th in the nation. This isn’t a good sign as the top two Wildcats scorers (Bailey and Pope) do their damage pretty much exclusively on the inside. Those two combine for about 30 a game and tonight I feel like 40 or so between that duo is very realistic. On the other side the Hornets are led by their backcourt duo of Crosby and Wiley who granted are not very efficient players. That said if there’s a defense in this conference they’d want to see (aside from Howard) it’s probably Bethune Cookman. Let’s work out the bulbs in that scoreboard.

Summary: 

Notre Dame (-3.5)
Bethune Cookman/Delaware State Ov 160.5

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