JEEPERS, SLEEPERS
Off-the-grid teams that can cause trouble down stretch and in March
LAS VEGAS — March is just around the corner and that means conference tournaments and the Big Dance will be here soon. While many of the blue-blood programs are having stellar years, some of the best bets this season so far and moving forward may not have the pedigree of a Duke or Kentucky.
Entering the weekend, the team with the country’s best record against the spread is Drake. Little was expected of this team coming into the season, and it has crushed all expectations with first-year coach Darian DeVries to be tied with Loyola Chicago atop the Missouri Valley Conference, and has done so with a 21-5 ATS record.
The team also has overcome the loss of its starting point guard Nick Norton in early January, but has seen Brady Ellingson step up with 13.9 points per game while making 55.7 percent of his 3-pointers since Norton’s injury.
Despite being a Top 10 team and at one time having one of the most exciting programs in college basketball, Houston is not getting the type of buzz most teams with 25-1 records do. The Cougars may not have great size, but they make do and are eighth among Division I teams in rebound rate.
Each of the team’s top three scorers makes more than 37.5 percent of 3-pointers, and this is the third-best team in the country in opposing teams’ 3-point shooting percentage.
Houston is 17-8-1 ATS this season and owns the nation’s longest home win- ning streak at 32 games. Despite having the nation’s top overall win percentage, the Cougars check in at 50/1 at William Hill to win that national championship. With Duke dealing with an injury to Zion Williamson and Gonzaga to Killian Tillie, it might make a team that does not have ideal size worth a bit more of a look.
While Houston does it with defense, another sleeper who’s name starts with an H lights it up on offense, and that is Hofstra. The Pride of the Colonial are 19-7 against the spread this year and rank third in the country in offensive efficiency. Hofstra is 12th in the country in team 3-point shooting percentage and leads the nation by shooting 80.3 percent at the freethrow line. Justin WrightForeman is third in the country in points per game with 26.3 and each of the team’s top six scorers that has shot a 3-pointer this year makes at least 35.9 percent of them.
Washington is 10-2 against the spread in Pac-12 play and seems to be the best hope of an at-large bid for the conference. The Huskies have been doing it on defense with eight of their past nine games going under the total. They have allowed an opponent to score more than 70 points just once since Jan. 1.
Matisse Thybulle is the nation’s leader in steals per game at 3.4 per contest to round out a backcourt that includes Jaylen Nowell, who is shooting 44 percent from 3-point range and pouring in more than 16 points per game. With the Huskies being 75/1 to win the championship, it could create some lucrative hedging possibilities if the Huskies get a good draw for the NCAA Tournament.
One conference that is currently offering a lot of teams that can pull an upset or two in the NCAA Tournament is the SoCon. Furman burst onto the college basketball landscape with its win at the beginning of the season against Villanova and has one of the best passing big men in the country in Matt Rafferty. He is averaging 17 points, nine rebounds, and 4.2 assists per game, leading the team in all categories.
Wofford also has what it takes to stun a few giants, spearheaded by each of its top four players shooting better than 40 percent from 3-point range. The Terriers defeated South Carolina on the road by 21 points earlier this year and look to be in contention for an at-large NCAA Tournament bid with a 23-4 record straight up, including an unblemished 15-0 mark in SoCon play.
And then there is UNCGreenboro, the team that made the big dance from this conference a season ago as a 13 seed and very nearly knocked off Gonzaga. The Spartans are 13th in the country in percent of opponents’ possessions that end in a turnover and have a guy in the interior in James Dickey who blocks an average of two shots per game.
Some of the most profitable teams this season have been bigger programs such as Virginia, Michigan State, and Gonzaga, but with the casual bettor now being more focused on college basketball, it will likely lead to the value on these programs drying up. Many of these schools are off the radar, which will lead to them continuing to be profitable as the games get bigger along with the amount of people betting these games.