Editor’s Note: Since November 2018, Joe has been publishing picks here and back at All Things NIT, our former site. Overall, the results have been mixed, with an average return on investment, per pick, of –0.7% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 6,897 published picks, not including pending futures; and an average return on investment, per pick, of +2.2% across 2,268 completed high and medium-confidence picks. The low confidence picks are the problem. Most of our picks are in the low confidence category.
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’re afraid you might have a gambling problem, seek help.
Odds for these come from the better option between Bovada and BetOnline. We used to use the Vegas Consensus, but it’s no longer consistently available in an accurate form online. We use kenpom heavily to make college basketball picks. We use our own college basketball model to evaluate college basketball futures.
Active markets today: College basketball, but only the single-day (futures return on Monday and are scheduled to be daily from there on out).
Single-day college basketball bets: On the season, we’re 110–77–1 and we’re down 2.77 units. We’re currently mostly betting moneyline favorites, so our win–loss record doesn’t line up with our net loss.
Penn State @ Minnesota
We’re back on moneylines today, with more favorites we’re confident in to win. We aren’t hewing as closely to the parameters as we were for most of February—that season has passed, we’re into the home stretch now and that changes the recipe—but we do like all these teams to win, and some of them are very close to those parameters.
Minnesota is playing some of the best basketball it’s played all year, and losing to two good teams in a row on the road doesn’t change that. They should handle Penn State and get back to .500 in the Big Ten.
Pick: Minnesota to win –275. Low confidence.
Cornell @ Princeton
Princeton is a much better team than Cornell, for as fun as Cornell has been this year. We think the Tigers correct what happened when these two played in Ithaca and put themselves in position to wrap up the Ivy League 1-seed on the ratings tiebreaker.
Pick: Princeton to win –200. Low confidence.
Kansas State @ Cincinnati
Cincinnati is not a bad team. They’ve played bad games, and they’ve lost a lot of those lately, but they are, as Princeton is to Cornell, the much better team here. We think they stop the three-game losing streak and keep their bubble hopes alive going to Norman on Tuesday.
Pick: Cincinnati to win -265. Low confidence.
