On the first day of the NCAA Tournament on Thursday, the 11 seeds dominated, going 3-0 against No. 6 seeds, setting up three intriguing 3 vs. 11 matchups on Saturday.
I’ve got two of them covered here as my best bets for Saturday’s Round of 32 action.
Midwest Region: (3) Creighton vs. (11) Oregon
The NCAA Tournament is a different animal from the regular season and even conference tournaments.
Some head coaches and their staffs struggle with the short turnaround times and game planning for multiple opponents.
Greg McDermott, for example, has been a middling coach against the spread in the tournament. Since taking over at Creighton in 2010, he’s 9-9 against the closing number.
Oregon’s Dana Altman, on the other hand, is a March killer. The Ducks’ head coach is a sterling 16-6-1 against the spread in the tourney, and critically 10-3 ATS as a seed underdog.
On Saturday, Oregon will have the best player on the floor in N’Faly Dante. His heater continued for the Ducks with an opening-round stat line of 23 points, six rebounds, two steals and two rejections against South Carolina in a runaway win.
His length and athleticism present problems on both ends of the floor and he has the chance to get Creighton’s Ryan Kalkbrenner in foul trouble, an element that could flip this game.
The Bluejays’ “KalkDrop” defense requires their 7-foot-1 center to stay out of foul trouble, so that’s something to monitor from a live-betting perspective.
Beyond Dante, Oregon has had a top-30 offense since March 1, according to Bart Torvik.
They’ve carved teams up inside the arc and there’s still more room for growth because they’ve been unlucky from deep. Oregon is connecting on just 26.4 percent of its three-point attempts this month.
Oregon also enters as one of the Pac-12’s best teams when playing up to higher-rated squads.
Creighton, on the other hand, plays better against lower competition and struggles a bit against quality opponents.
The Bluejays were also subpar on natural floors going just 2-3 against the spread, with Oregon posting a 5-3 ATS record in those spots.
Recommendation: Oregon +5.5.
Betting on College Basketball?
East Region: (3) Illinois vs. (11) Duquesne
March matchups often boil down to teams imposing their preferred pace. Illinois just broke a team that wanted to play slower, dropping 85 points on Morehead State in a 16-point win on Thursday.
Morehead State brought a lot more to the table offensively in its loss than Duquesne did in its opening win. The Dukes, who played a perfect game against BYU, limited the Cougars’ possessions in one of the biggest upsets of Round 1.
Even if Duquesne is able to slow things down a bit, I believe the bottom is going to fall out on the offensive end.
The Dukes sit outside the top 200 in shooting, shooting efficiency and defensive rebounding percentage. The key will be how they shoot from long range because they aren’t efficient enough running their offense in the half court.
On the season, they shot at a 34 percent clip from long range, but they made 7 of 18 against BYU and won the turnover battle. A similar performance will be required against Illinois, and I’m not bullish on that happening.
The Illini, who enter with a top-20 offensive rebounding rate, should eat Duquesne up on the offensive glass. And they’ll do everything they can to turn this into a track meet.
Morehead State tried to slow things down but couldn’t keep Illinois out of transition in the second half (14 fast-break points), and that’s when the roof caved in on the Eagles.
The Fighting Illini led the Big Ten in Kill Shot runs with 23 this season. In other words, when it rains it pours facing an uptempo Brad Underwood offense.
Terrance Shannon Jr. vs. Jimmy Clark is the matchup to watch, but I’m betting on Illinois’ overall quality on the offensive end winning the day.
Recommendation: Illinois -9.5.