Johnnies set up to clobber Crusaders
Feast Week is almost over, but the season of giving is right around the corner. With that in mind, there are two college basketball games that are giving bettors plus-sized value on Saturday. Both matchups differ from my power rankings by at least five points.
Holy Cross at St. John’s
Recommendation: SJU -22 (Play to
-25) — Holy Cross visits Carnesecca Arena as a bit of a mystery. The Crusaders have a road upset of Georgetown on their résumé, but they also have a 38point loss at Winthrop.
The Georgetown win remains one of the biggest head-scratchers of the young season because Georgetown buried 11 threes to Holy Cross’ five, and turned the Crusaders over 12 times while only giving it away four times. Those are key stats that would usually translate to a Georgetown runaway.
But that 68-67 win continues to inflate Holy Cross’ value and given that they’re coming off a win over IUPUI, it’s likely we’re going to get an advantageous number to fade the Crusaders.
As for the Johnnies, their 11point win over Utah last week demonstrated what high-end play will look like under Rick Pitino in Jamaica this season.
St. John’s performance had all the trappings of a vintage Pitino-coached team, including a flurry of 3-pointers (13-for-26), bountiful transition opportunities (16 points), and balanced scoring.
That last factor is why I like backing them as a big favorite. The Johnnies are led by Joel Soriano’s 16.2 ppg, Daniss Jenkins’ 15.0 and Jordan Dingle’s 11.4, but even with different rotations in garbage time, they’ll still be effective on the offensive end. According to Bart Torvik’s adjusted offensive efficiency metric, SJU is 26th offensively. Toss in elite work on the offensive glass, and I foresee a 90-point performance against an undersized Crusaders starting lineup (zero starters over 6-foot-6). I would play this all the way up to -25.
Vermont at Bradley
Recommendation: Vermont +4 (Play to 3.5) — The Catamounts have opened the season 5-1, dropping their only game to a Liberty squad that appears destined to go dancing come March. Even in that defeat, they were within a point of Liberty at the final media timeout.
This year’s Vermont team is reminiscent of recent America East champions out of Burlington: They prefer to play four guards, they don’t beat themselves with turnovers and they have three experienced starters that average over 13 ppg. Cracking the Bradley defense will require another group effort because the Braves have a top-60 defense, according to multiple outlets (ShotQuality, Torvik, KenPom).
The reason why Bradley opened as a five-point favorite is that the Braves are not only a solid team through and through, but they’ve been a winning team to back at home in the past five seasons. At Carver Arena, Bradley has covered 68 percent of its games since 2019, which is tops in the Missouri Valley Conference and fourth nationally. But in this game, with their student body still on Thanksgiving break, I believe their famed home-court advantage will be slightly muted.
The Catamounts have won seven straight America East regular-season titles and five of the last seven automatic bids to the NCAA Tournament. They’re well-coached and have the perimeter shooting (all five starters 35 percent or better from 3-point range) to stay away from Bradley’s advantage in the paint. The Braves’ frontcourt duo of Malevy Leons and Darius Hannah combines to average 26.5 points, 14.5 rebounds and 6.4 “stocks” per game. They have eaten up other mid-major front courts, so I’m happy that Vermont will prefer to pick away at this Bradley defense from a distance.