saturday ncaa basketball plays....

[gman2]

(had carolina under 165 earlier)

eastern michigan (+9) over western michigan
st.marys (+16) over gonzaga
akron (+6) over toledo

eastern michigan......i know wmu is ripping teams apart right now, but i think this is way too much conference road chalk, especially in a rivalry game. eagles nothing special, but they shoot the 3 well enough to stay in this game. scheduling-wise, this is as good as the spot can get for emu (if theyre to ever have a chance). wmu coming in off a string of blowout wins.....and an enormous game up next with kent state. emu can catch wmu peeking ahead imo and stay w/in single digits.

akron....zips are young, which is always a red flag when playing em on the road, but toledo is in the same boat. both teams have lots of young talent. neither team plays defense. should be lots of scoring runs in this one. but when its all said and done, i think hollingsworth and tarver carry the young zips on their veteran backs and possibly get the outright here. zips should be able to control the glass vs toledo. rockets not a particularly good rebounding team.

 

[gman2]

st.marys.....i think the gaels can hang here. gonzaga is sort of in wmu's boat. they havent been tested in forever. only difference is that gonzaga is clearly the class of the wcc so theres never going to be any "lookahead games" for them to worry about. but i like the way marys rebounds the ball- thats a key when facing gonzaga. if you cant hang on the glass, youll get killed. theyre also a good free throw shooting team. if they play their cards right, this can be a much closer game than many expect. teams coming off 3 straight blowout wins are normally good to go against. not gonna be easy, but marys should keep this inside the number

 

[vinnie]

took St Marys good luck on all