Editor’s Note: Over a sample size of 633 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 12% when weighted by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high). This, compared to other picks consistently published online, is very good. It’s also good 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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Three picks tonight, all in college basketball.
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, Team Rankings, 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.
Georgia Southern @ North Florida
I’m not sure if this game is televised, but if you love points, you might want to try to find it.
North Florida ranked among the top 25 fastest-paced teams in college basketball the last two seasons. They attempted 34 three’s last week against Florida, compared to just 23 two’s. They might not make an exceptionally high portion of them, but it’s entertaining.
Georgia Southern dialed up their own tempo last season, and so far this year’s looking comparably fast, as they opened with an 80-possession affair in Auburn. They aren’t as three-happy as the Ospreys, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t going to hit a high shot volume.
Overall, Georgia Southern’s the better team in this one. North Florida, though, has home-court advantage, which nearly erases that gap, leaving behind a puzzlingly wide moneyline. A loss is more likely than a win with this pick, but the expected value makes it worthwhile.
Pick: North Florida to win (+155). Low confidence.
Texas A&M-Corpus Christi @ Vanderbilt
The coastal counterpart to the more notable Texas A&M has a decent shot at making the Southland Conference Tournament this year.
That’s not a good sign.
Still, while the Islanders have little cause for optimism, especially before conference play begins, they’ve managed to draw one of the worst power conference teams in the country tonight, just one year removed from that team going winless across an 18-game SEC season.
Vanderbilt was happy to shoot a lot of three’s in their opener against Southeast Missouri State, and given that one of TAMU-CC’s few strengths in 2018-19 was defending against two-point field goal attempts, one would guess the Commodores will use the same strategy tonight. But while it’s fair to guess Aaron Nesmith, who attempted eleven three-point shots in the opener, has taken steps forward from his 33.7% performance beyond the arc last year, it’s doubtful he’ll make seven again tonight.
The Islanders aren’t good. But neither, exactly, are the Commodores.
Pick: Texas A&M-Corpus Christi +17.5 (-110). Low confidence.
Florida Atlantic @ Alabama
There are two things that could be behind this total rising as high as it has.
The first is that Herbert Jones, one of Alabama’s better defenders, is a gametime decision after leaving Tuesday’s close loss to Penn early with a hyperextended elbow.
The second is that the betting public expects Alabama’s offense to play even faster than the 13.8-seconds-per-possession pace they played in their opener.
Nate Oats succeeded at Buffalo by pushing the tempo, and he’s brought that style to Alabama. That’s already factored in, though, to most projections. KenPom expects the Crimson Tide to average about 77 possessions per game after adjusting for opponent tempo, the fourth-most in the country. Even if they manage that pace tonight (with a possibly depleted lineup), they and FAU would have to combine to average more than two points on each trip up and down the court. That’s a lot to ask from FAU’s bottom-half-of-Division-I offense, even if Jones isn’t on the floor.
Pick: Under 156 (-110). Low confidence.
