Editor’s Note: For a little more than three years now, Joe has been publishing picks here and back at All Things NIT, our former site. Overall, the results have been positive, with an average return on investment, per pick, of 0.6% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 1,983 published picks, not including bets that remain pending, like futures. 0.6% doesn’t sound amazing, but relative to what else you get on the internet?
Use these picks at your own risk. Only you are responsible for any money you lose, and you should not bet more than you can afford to lose. If you have a gambling problem, get help.
Lines for these come from the Vegas consensus or the closest approximation available at the time picks are written, unless otherwise noted. KenPom is heavily used in making college basketball picks.
Illinois @ Maryland
It’s a point in the season where things could really go awry for Illinois. They just missed a big chance against Purdue, they have only two obvious wins left on the schedule (obvious meaning home game against a sub-NIT team), and Kofi Cockburn is out with a concussion. Still…Maryland’s going through the ringer. Maryland doesn’t have a whole lot to play for. And Illinois, though definitely worse without Cockburn, has dealt with plenty of mixing and matching this year. The long-term concerns are legitimate—just look at what Andre Curbelo’s had to say about his own concussion symptoms, and how they lingered—but the short-term concerns are likely overblown. This is a fair line, but we’ll take it. Over anything else on the board tonight.
Pick: Illinois -4.5 (-110). Low confidence.
