Editor’s Note: Over a sample size of 844 completed bets (this doesn’t include outstanding futures picks), Joe’s picks published here and back at All Things NIT, our former site, have an average return on investment of 8% when weighted by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high). This, compared to other picks consistently published online, is pretty good. More broadly, it’s adequate when compared to conventional annual investments, and instead of taking a year to bring that return, it’s taking between three hours and seven months. In short, Joe’s got a good track record.
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Two picks for tonight.
As always:
- Lines come from the Vegas Consensus at the time this is written, or the best approximation I can find of it online.
- Data and predictions from KenPom, FanGraphs, Baseball Savant, and ESPN is/are often used and/or cited.
- The blurbs often aren’t justifications of the picks. Often, they’re instead just notes about something or someone related to the pick. Something that interests me. I don’t explain the picks because in general, the rationale behind each pick is the same, so it would be boring to say over and over again that the numbers I use project a good return on investment and I see no red flags significant enough to make me hold off.
Harvard @ Yale
It’s a big game. Harvard’s one of the three teams in the Ivy League with much hope of beating Yale this year. Harvard’s also Yale’s arch-rival. And, for those to whom it matters, Harvard is indeed a two-time defending Ivy League regular season champion.
But things don’t look too promising for the Crimson tonight. They’re a fine team, and they’re definitely capable of hanging with the Bulldogs, but it’s hard to find areas in which they can gain enough of an advantage to win. Yale’s offense does rely heavily on the three, which one would presume adds some variability to the Bulldogs’ performance, but Yale is less likely than normal to go cold tonight against a Harvard team that struggles to defend the perimeter. Beyond that, Yale doesn’t give many areas to exploit. They box out on defense. They don’t foul. Eric Monroe is turnover-prone at times, but again, Harvard’s not a team one would expect to force that issue.
It’s very possible Harvard will win. It’s just hard to see how exactly they’d do it.
Pick: Yale to win (-260). Low confidence.
Davidson @ VCU
Tonight could go very badly for VCU. It’s not likely, but Davidson’s ability to slow games down and connect from deep are traits that heighten the impact of randomness, bringing the teams’ respective projections closer to one another on aggregate. And the VCU’s defense one saving grace when it comes to counteracting this sort of play—forcing turnovers so the Rams can get out on the break—is something Davidson is significantly adept at mitigating through their own strong ball protection and predisposition to getting back on defense.
If tonight does go badly for VCU, it will have gone very badly, because VCU’s in a precarious position on the bubble. Beyond a home victory over LSU, they don’t have anything too significant in the win column, and they don’t have many opportunities left: just one visit from Dayton, plus possible games against URI and Dayton in the A-10 tournament. A loss tonight would be their first true bad one, setting their tournament hopes back mightily.
A Davidson triumph is not likely. But it’s worth a shot.
Pick: Davidson to win (+340). Low confidence.
