The NCAA tournament gets all the glory, but don’t sleep on the conference championships, writes Steve Makinen:
I know many colleagues in the industry that prefer the next two weeks because of the sheer volume of games, as well as the familiarity of opponents that the conference tournament weeks bring. In fact, some professional bettors spend much more time, resources, and bankroll on the conference tourneys than they do on the NCAAs, NIT, CIT, and CBI combined.
Over the next week or so, we will be posting previews of all 31 conference tournaments.
You can see the format here for the Atlantic Sun tournament, which begins today.
Adam Burke covers the favorite (Lipscomb), potential darkhorses, players to watch and makes a prediction. Steve puts together a chart (see above, click to make bigger) with his three sets of power ratings and contributes the best of his tourney trends.
For example:
>Single-digit underdogs in the Atlantic Sun tournament are 24-25 SU but 32-15-2 ATS (68.1%) since 2014, while double-digit favorites are on a 33-2 SU and 18-15-2 ATS (54.5%) surge in that same span.
>Home teams in the Atlantic Sun semifinal games are 13-7 SU, but just 7-13 ATS (35%) in their last 20 tries.
>>Atlantic Sun preview with handy bracket.
If you want to get ahead, Steve has already posted all the top trends for the mid-major conference tourneys.
We’ll post links to all of the tournament previews on this page, usually 48 hours in advance of tip-off. (We are usually just waiting for the odds, but the books are faster than in the past.)
Today in College Basketball
Greg Peterson has posted his Best Bets for today’s menu.
You can find Greg’s handicapped lines for every game here and the latest episode of his Coast-to-Coast Hoops podcast here.
>Josh Appelbaum will post his Sharp Report later this morning.
>Adam Burke will have his Best Bets later, too.
>Makinen’s power ratings with estimated scores
>DraftKings/Circa Betting Splits.
Circa Challenge results
Week 3 of the Circa College Hoops Challenge is in the books.
Texas pro handicapper Paul Stone is leading with an 11-4 record.
>>Updated standings and graded picks.
NASCAR hits the road
Steve Makinen has uploaded his final simulation for today’s NASCAR race at Circuit of Americas in Austin and shared his analysis:
After dominating the practice session on Saturday, road course ace Shane Van Gisbergen vaults to the top spot on the final simulation, followed by Kyle Larson, Tyler Reddick, Ross Chastain and Chase Elliott.
Typically, barring any big wrecks, starting spot and practice speeds are crucial at road courses, much more than we’ve witnessed the last two weeks
My final predictions based upon what I’ve seen Saturday:
Top 5 – Van Gisbergen, Larson, Elliott, Reddick, Suarez
Top underdogs – Suarez, Allmendinger, Hocevar, Zilisch
Favorites to struggle – Keselowski, Hamlin, Logano, Busch
Quick Hits
NBA: Zach Cohen will have his plays later this morning.
NHL: Jonathan Davis will have his Best Bets later today.
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