For the second year in a row, we’re dealing with game cancellations in the college basketball world due to the spread of the COVID-19 Omicron variant. In the Big East, the conference rules state that teams that cannot play a conference game due to the virus must forfeit, which will be interesting to see how things go moving forward in the league. So far, DePaul, who has gotten off to a surprising start, has had to forfeit two games, and ranked Seton Hall had to forfeit their conference opener against St. John’s last night. With the highly contagious variant expected to spread and causing havoc in other sports (the NHL headed for their Christmas break early, and the NFL had to delay three games over the weekend), this will be an interesting wrinkle to follow in the Big East season.
Speaking of that conference, there is an interesting game on the schedule for tonight that highlights our best bets for NCAAB men’s college basketball for tonight.
Villanova started the season ranked in the top 10 of the AP poll and stayed there amid losses to fellow top-ranked teams, including Purdue, UCLA, and Baylor. But a disappointing 79-59 loss at Creighton last week that saw their shooting woes continue led to a major drop in the polls, as the Wildcats are now 23rd in the latest rankings. Now they will try to avoid an 0-2 start in Big East play when they host the No. 18 Xavier Musketeers, who are on a seven-game winning streak.
After scoring 67, 36, and 59 points in their last three games, Villanova’s (7-4) scoring average is down to 72.6 points per game, which is five points below Xavier’s average. The Musketeers are also allowing two points per game fewer than Nova on the season (61 PPG vs. 63 PPG). Nova’s last three rough performances were all away from home however, where they return to tonight and are outscoring opponents by an average of 91-63 on the year. But this is their first matchup against a ranked team at home.
Xavier (11-1) owns a win over Ohio State at home and has handled all of their opponents outside of a loss at still-unbeaten Iowa State in the NIT Tip-Off tournament. During this winning streak, they have won games over Virginia Tech, Cincinnati, Marquette, and at Oklahoma State.
Nova coach Jay Wright hopes that the losses to top competition will help his team in conference play, but the 20-point loss at Creighton last week showed that the Wildcats have to fix their shooting woes, and while they may battle to a win tonight on their home court, winning by more than six seems like a lot to ask for against a Xavier team that’s 9-3 against the spread this year.
Michigan State has opened 2-0 in Big Ten play but takes a break from in-conference competition to play a neutral-site game against fellow Michigan team Oakland at the Little Caesars Arena in Detroit tonight. With the game taking place close to Oakland’s campus, beware the mid-major playing the local big brother team, as we’ve seen a number of times so far this year (notably with Old Dominion beating Virginia a couple weeks ago).
The Spartans are 11-point favorites here and are on a four-game winning streak, but they have only won one of those games by more than 13 points. Oakland, meanwhile, hasn’t played since December 7, where they lost at Bowling Green. Prior to that, they won five straight and went 4-1 against the spread in that span. Michigan State, meanwhile, is 4-3 ATS in their last seven games.
Oakland’s key player is Jamal Cain, who is averaging a double-double with 21.4 points and 10.5 rebounds per game. The Grizzlies are averaging 69.9 points per game but have scored over that number in each of their last five games.
Head-to-head, the Spartans have won the last 10 annual matchups between the teams, but the series is 5-5 ATS in those 10 games. Oakland is 7-3 both straight up and against the spread this season, while Michigan State is 11-2 and a solid 7-4 ATS, but they are just 1-3 ATS in neutral-site games such as this one. We expect Oakland to be competitive, and while they may fall short, we see the outcome being in single digits.
Kansas continues its non-conference play with a matchup at former Big 12 rival Colorado, where the Buffaloes are 7-1 at home but face a major increase in competition tonight.
Outside of a win in the season-opener against Michigan State on a neutral floor, the Jayhawks haven’t played a challenging non-conference schedule. Their win at St. John’s was a good one, and they had a 13-point win over a strong Iona team. Kansas’s only blemish on the season was a one-point loss to Dayton in the ESPN Events Invitational in Orlando thanks to a buzzer-beating jumper. Senior Ochai Agbaji has been a dangerous shooter for Kansas, leading the team with 22 points per game and is shooting nearly 50% from 3-point territory.
The Buffaloes (9-3) is 7-1 at home this year but they are not winning convincingly over non-conference foes, as Colorado is just 1-5-2 against the spread on their home floor. They are also 0-2 both straight up and ATS against ranked teams this year in losses to Tennessee and UCLA. While Colorado is 6-4 ATS in their last 10 meetings with the Jayhawks, Kansas has won 20 of the last 21 matchups. In their only meeting since 2013, Kansas won 72-58 two years ago as 10.5-point favorites.
The Jayhawks are 10-point favorites tonight, and we see them covering as Colorado will have a hard time with the increase in competition.
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