friday ncaa tourney plays..........

[gman2]

hit the smaller play on wisconsin under, but lost the bigger play on duke/moneyline over kansas. no regrets about duke- simply didnt hit the play. devils had their shots to win it for sure- but kansas simply got the job done. jayhawks deserve the credit. devils played a solid game. kansas simply played better. and to all kansas bettors- i give props. nice win guys! for real, no sense in over-analyzing a certain outcome. that line reflected the outcome to a "T". kansas is about 4 to 6 points better than duke right now. devils gave em a game and won the first 35:00 minutes, but the kansas guys won the most important last 5:00, and thats the money-time. props to kansas bettors.

for friday, played these, and made a few alterations to the previous friday post:

3 units.....(upgrade).....butler (+7) over oklahoma
1 unit.......auburn/syracuse under 140

very tempted to play auburn as well, but feel like the total is the better play in that game. not sure why people are predicting a close blowout. auburn actually matches up very well with syrcause. but that game being played in albany could push syracuse over the edge and even though its not a "huge" advantage and is a little overrated in terms of importance, i just dont like that dynamic. but i think the cuse zone should give auburn some trouble, or at least enough to keep it under 140.

 

[Woizeee]

Gotta agree Gman, duke had all the chances in the world to cover here but reddick decided TODAY lol of all days to be off.. oh well u cant win them all. I played duke small but nailed Marq and Wisky Under... i like that auburn under big time tomorrow.. both teams are athletic and play a fast pace game but not the best pure shooters. If Mcnamara isnt hitting his 3;s this will go under and pretty easily i think.. I see a 68-62 final or so... Just to see some #'s...

Over the last few games Auburn has played some good D giving up 67 pts @ miss st, 53 against Tenn, 62 against St joes and 62 against WF. thats solid numbers right there. If they can limit cuse to 68 or under we should be ok...

Syracuse while not great at D has been decent lately...

gave up 74 to rutgers...
69 to gtown
80 to uconn (bad game but Uconn's Offense is much superior to Auburns)
65 to Manhattan
56 to Ok st....

These numbers favor a play on the UNDER, plus these teams match up well agaisnt each other and I am really feeling this under.. baring OT, i think this will come through...

Butler i will play also, gotta ride the hot train..

Also if that Zona/Kansas game line is Zona -4 or less im pounding Zona. Kansas isnt deep enough to play with Zona.. Zona wins by 8-10... Gardner, Stoudamire, Frye, Walton, Anderson, Iguadala, Adams just too much. If Zona plays ANY sort of D i see a W here....

GL fellas...

 

[gman2]

just some words on the buter game, as im reading some posts that say "butler wont get all those open looks vs the oklahoma defense" or "butler wont shoot as well as they did in the first two rounds".

after watching butler in person this year, and seeing a handful of their regular season games, as well as the first two rounds of the tourney, its become evident that this team has some pure shooters that can flat out stroke it.

it seems to me like some are overlooking butlers 1st two opponents. butler just beat mississippi state (the 2nd best team in the sec) and louisville (the best team in conference usa). both of those teams were very aggressive on defense and tried to play physical with butler- and butler still found a way to get it done. the bulldogs beat two tenacious, swarming-type defenses. so its not like they will have "no clue" vs okie's defense.

i dont buy the fact that butler "lives and dies by the three", because its really a different kind of offense that they run compared to so many other programs. they run that "perimeter weave" to perfection and all 5 guys on the floor are capable of hitting the open 3. their offense is predicated on hitting the open shots and open 3's- but its not like they have nothing inside. cornette isnt exactly a banger- but he can play inside and lightfoot has a deft touch near the basket.

to me- yeah, oklahoma obviously has some advantages, but thats reflected in the line. however everyone expected butler to be hurt by mario austin and the size of msu in the opening round. butler adjusted and found a way.

the best thing about their louisville win was that they won without even getting a big scoring contribution from brandon miller. that showed me something.

i think this game will follow the pace of the msu/butler game in the opening round where every possession is critical and the game will be real low scoring- thus giving a ton of value to butler +7. and it doesnt hurt that oklahoma has a habit of being unable to shut the door on teams. with the way butler can shoot it- i just dont see butler ever trailing by double digits. they should always be within a basket or two imo.

 

[genosays]

Gman, any thoughts on the OU/Butler total .... 120 seems awful low but maybe that's what the linesmaker wants me to think?? 1st two rounds for Butler were opposite kind of games (low scoring defensive type battle & up and down vs Louisville). So kind of hard to get a read on how this game will be played. Oklahoma unders have been good this year, but ....

 

[gman2]

geno:

youre right- the total kind of messes with your mind on this one. i think its gonna go under actually. if you got a chance to actually watch the 1st round game vs miss state- that was a phenomenal game played by both teams, they both hit a lot of 3's- and the total didnt even crack 100. it wasnt like teams were "stalling", it was just good, hard basketball. clearly louisville wanted to push the tempo, and butler obliged and ran with em. but oklahoma obviously wants to grind you out- and butler is used to playing that way.

the oklahoma/okie state matchups stand out this year (for comparison). both of those games had really low totals (like this butler/okie game) - and both still stayed well under the number:
1st meeting.....oklahoma state 48-46
2nd meeting....oklahoma 64-48
i draw that comparison because that is the type of game we could see tonight. even though the number is really low, i think it takes some nads to play the over.

having said that- if there is any extended scoring spurt by either team- with the total being so low, that could put an under in jeopardy.

but to me- and im hardly a numbers guy and i dont "project scores" or anything, but this game has 27-24 halftime and 58-54 final written all over it.

 

[pistol229]

Gman

Gman

FYI,

Butler averages about 43% of their FGs from 3 and this was pretry consistent in the first two rounds.

Mario Austin ate these guys for lunch in the first round -
38 8-12 1-4 2 10 0 1 18

the rest of the team just sucked.

Not advocating OU, but just so you know

 

[Kade]

Gman, thanks once again for the informative write up.
Good luck to you.

Kade

 

[caper]

love your writeups, gman, much appreciated...off to the pepsi (sold out in 2 days last year, scalp prices today reportedly in the $700-$800 range--i lucked out w/ a corp box), today w/ you on butler+7.5, also butler u120, on ky u129.5 (does anyone remember cotton nash, SI cover '65?--he taught me how to shoot a jump shot when he played for cotuit in the cape cod baseball league), kan O155 (see both teams in the 80's--does anyone remember dukies art heyman/jeff mullins?)...i think we make $$ this wkend...gl, caper

 

[gman2]

caper:

enjoy the games. had plans to be in albany to catch these games tonight as well- but with the deacons getting bounced- that changed plans. i think youre on the right side with butler under.

gl

 

[pt1gard]

gman

gman

trying butler small but i am interested to see how many quality loox they get like they did vs Pitino who wouldnt stop trapping and try to stay SU on Butler .. OU should do this and I think lower scoring than posted # ...

take care, gregg