DRF Sports: 0:01

Welcome to the DRF sports podcast brought to you by DRF. Sports. America's most trusted name in horse racing is now providing sports bettors with exclusive data analytics previews videos and expert picks on all major sports, but smarter and have more fun doing it. It's the DRF sports podcast and now, your host, Sheldon Alexander. Ready Set that

Sheldon: 0:27

this is the DRF sports podcast episode 58. Don't forget to like and follow wherever you get your podcasts. I'm your host Shogun Alexander the madness continues as the sweet 16 is ready to get underway this Thursday. And of course, we will break all of that down each and every single game giving you some tricks. But first, be approved when with DRF sports pro introducing DRF sports, all new premium data feature on drf.com/sports. For $99 a year which is 825 a month, you can get industry leading bets trends, angles and analytics. With the madness here. It's the best way for you to make some money and have fun while doing it. That's DRF sports pro Sign up now at drf.com/sports. And hopefully as always, we can keep our pro pics here going well on the pot 16 teams left, which means eight games for us to try and find the value and win some money. And for that deep dive had to bring back our guy, Mr. Matt rusty to break things down. And luckily for y'all starts right about now. It's almost like we're all going through a little bit of withdrawal here. As we go from the high of wall to wall college basketball action to a couple of days without it. It seems so strange. But as we look towards Thursday, we know the sweet 16 is here, which means there's more games for us to bet on. And to do that. Here's my guide Mr. Matt Russell, once again to deep dive into the game by game action up sweet 16. Mr. Matt Russell, how're you doing?

Matt: 2:12

I'm good. I'm keeping it together. I made the mistake was not a mistake necessarily. Early on in the week, Nit lines came out. And I bet on two games. And I was all excited. I was like, okay, Tuesday night we're back. You know, maybe it's not the NCAA tournament, we got a little nit action. And then I realized both games that I bet on, were on Wednesday night. And so I had to wait one extra day for that and I missed up, quote unquote, missed quite a sweat last night in the NIT when the last seven seconds of Xavier and Vanderbilt lasted 20 plus minutes with back to back to back. They were literally trading timeouts. At one point. There was multiple reviews, and a series of fouls as well. And the game landed, I believe the line was two and a half and the game landed on two. So it was quite the sweat for betters out there. Not for me. I'm playing. What do I have tonight? I have Washington state plus three and a half tonight. And I have Texas a&m minus two and a half tonight in the NIT. So yeah, do my best to to, to to hold off the full scale withdrawals when it comes to basketball. And of course the women's tournament watched a handful of that on Monday as well. Man when you talk home court advantage, apparently women's basketball or at least this season, meaningless because you got good teams losing at home. We should be sprinkled in the money line on some of these underdogs. But you know, we missed our opportunity. Who knew?

Sheldon: 3:43

We'll make those notes for next year in the must see TV outside of the madness. But speaking of said madness, let's get things going with the first matchup here. We got number four Arkansas verses number one Gonzaga Gonzaga nine and I'm seeing up to nine and a half at this point. I feel like that's too many points just because of the way that Gonzaga has been playing so far. Yes, they're able to pull away in the second half. I think they've been doing all right. But I just see it being a little bit of a slower pace here in Arkansas, being able to, to maybe keep it a little close. I'm not confident in it. But I'm picking a side which I forced myself to do on Earth.

Matt: 4:24

Yeah, if you need action I have I have Arkansas plus 1800 to make the final four from much earlier on in the season. And that's all I really want to be involved in when it comes to this game. Not that I even think Arkansas has much of a chance to win this game. My numbers eight and a half. So in the market has been inflated on Gonzaga all season long. So I'm not surprised that this went up to nine and a half because that would be more in line with how these teams have been rated all season. So there's nothing really like you know, I'm dying to play here. You know, as much as I have the Arkansas ticket it's hard for me to imagine a universe where they beat Gonzaga. Right, especially when you talk about, you know, the way that good sag is played, certainly in the first house, and maybe that's some sort of an angle, right? Maybe take Arkansas in the first half, maybe the first half money line, I don't know, something like that, where it's going to be not an outlier performance. But a trend that you're sort of, you know, able to play off of, that's going to pay out at a decent price, probably, I think, plus 250 type of range here for Arkansas moneyline in the first half, that would be just enough to tease me and my 1800 plus a 200 ticket in the same way that it did with my Memphis 50 212 in the region, as well. But, you know, we're talking about covering here and so Arkansas might have looked as bad as anyone you know, you get, like I said, you mentioned Gonzaga been struggling a little bit. Arkansas man, like that was ugly in those first two games. And they edge Vermont and New Mexico State in, you know, the least exciting way possible. But here's the thing, and you don't often I don't want to use the phrase there do because that's absolutely the laziest thing in the history of all like sports, betting and sports handicapping. But when it comes to college kids, man, you remember, it's like, it's any day back to back the same for you or for anybody that you knew. So this is an Arkansas team that, uh, you know, if you look at them season long, and you know, listen, the SEC has taken a bit of a hit reputation wise in this tournament, but it certainly felt like they were a pretty good basketball team. And it didn't look like they were a very good basketball team this past weekend, you change the locations. We'll talk about this with some of these other matchups. So you changed locations and like, I kind of expect the opposite for a lot of these teams the very next weekend. And Arkansas might be one of those teams, right? Maybe it's a oh man, we survived like, let's who like that's there that was close type of situation. They have the experience, both from a coaching standpoint, and from a player standpoint last year, having a nice little run. I believe it was to the regional final right against Baylor where they ended up getting hammered. Guess what everybody got hammered by Baylor. So, you know, I expect a lot better out of Arkansas. Here's the thing. Are we going to get? I'm going to call it the Duke factor because we're going to talk about it with regards to the next game in the West region. Is Gonzaga going to get this Duke factor situation? Right, because Memphis is frontcourt that on paper could handle Gonzaga. They end up getting fouled out, right? It was just fouls hand over fist there. Is Arkansas gonna get the same treatment? Are they going to get you know, they're gonna get fouled up? And by the way, does Arkansas even have the guys to get filed though? The best case for Arkansas might be that they just don't even have the front court to even get fouled out. And they might just end up you know, for guard lineup type situation here. They might just bomb threes and just hope for the best. But here's the problem. They have one guy who shoots better than 31% from the three point line, right? This isn't. I mean, this is Alabama because Alabama is a team that bombs threes. But it's it is Alabama and that Alabama has nobody who can shoot this season. But is it that strategy, and I mentioned Alabama, because they are one of the few teams that beat Gonzaga this year by deploying that strategy. And I don't want to say kind of getting lucky. But when you look at Alabama splits, they got lucky winning that game because they shot so well. So that's kind of Arkansas only chance here is to just kind of bomb away. Gonzaga got their scare in that first weekend. So I don't really have a ton here. The interesting thing to me, though, is on what I should say on what planet but like since when would you ever see the ninth highest rate of defense go up against the 15th rate of defense. And the total is 155 is up there for two teams that actually play pretty good defense, right? That 155 is like a Duke versus Michigan State type total. And I don't even think it was that I don't even think it was particularly close to that I think was 10 points lower. And so like I might be looking to play the under if I was looking to play anything. And that sort of allows me to kind of just keep my fingers crossed and hope Arkansas pulls something out. I feel this is sort of an 80 to 65 type game, though, with Gonzaga kind of pulling away, obviously throughout the second half as they have done because again, Arkansas offensively, I don't see them being able to have a ton of success. And defensively, it's not a very good matchup in my opinion for them. And so I understand why this has gone up both from a matchup standpoint, and from a market standpoint. So it's not something I'm dying to play. And when Gonzaga gets going and you know, why is it 155 Or both these teams play at a pretty high pace, obviously Gonzaga, one of the top tempo teams in the country. So like, when there are more possessions there are going to be more points. But maybe it's a situation where defensively both teams are able to show up play to their capabilities, and keep this under the number of 155 So I'll wait see if it goes up any more here. Maybe I'll put a small bet on the Under and again, keep my fingers crossed that Arkansas could pull off the victory. But I fully expect to consegue and handle them relatively easily in this first game on Thursday. Yeah, I

Sheldon: 10:09

love it. I love and as I mentioned, I don't really believe in Arkansas, but it is my vow to start fading and zag anytime they start playing real teams from real conferences. That trend in March Madness will continue. Let's move on to the 11th seeded Michigan versus number two Villanova Villanova favorite by five points in this game, and Juwan, Howard and company I feel as if like, they've already had their chip. But at the end of the day, you know, that's a pretty solid number. That's a lot of points there. And I feel like this game should be able to be close. So I actually like Michigan plus the points here. How do you see this?

Matt: 10:48

So it's hard for me to disagree with that sort of offhand. I just have a hard time believing that this version of Michigan is actually good, right? And that's part of, you know, your watch the season. And you're sitting there. And listen, there's very few games, very few games where Michigan was better than expected. On a given day, right? They might have covered a couple of games here and there, obviously. But there was very few where it was like, Yep, this is this Michigan version that can go on a run here. And obviously, Jones Jones, the point guard, like that's a situation right where, you know, he doesn't play because he's got a concussion, like, try to let him play and it doesn't go particularly well. Kind of a scary situation. If you're asking me where a player can be sort of Greenlit to play. And he gets out, he runs around for five minutes. And all of a sudden, it's like, no, no, this isn't gonna work. Like that's a little bit dicey. So I'm finding it hard to believe that this version with him out and kind of in general, is all that good. You know, I look at this Tennessee game that they just played. And that's the one where a seven and a half point underdogs. And listen, I can't believe I wasn't just absolutely hammering plus seven and a half in that game, I didn't have a bet on the side are totally in that game, especially with regards his involvement, the Vols got to the rim so so easily. And I think that's an indicator of problems on a defense, right? And Tennessee shot to have 18 from three. So when you look at that game, and by the way, Tennessee had the lead for the vast majority of that game, despite the fact that they couldn't shoot. And listen, man, you know, at this point, whether I don't want to brush the entire sport, with this, you know, with this brushstroke. Like it kind of just matters whether you hit your threes or not in basketball, certainly in college basketball. And if you're going to go to have a team, while Hunter Dickinson himself goes three of five, right when the seven foot center is stepping out from Michigan and canning trays at a 60% level, hitting three hitting more than your team like you're going to be in trouble if you're Tennessee, and it took them What 37 minutes to essentially blow that lead. I just I just don't see that being the case for a Villanova team that prides itself on its shooting, that runs good offense that has guard play that's going to be able to get to the rim in a you know, in this in as an efficient way as Tennessee's guards were able to so I just look at this and I go man, like that's kind of a quote unquote lucky performance for Michigan and the defense there. You know, it's funny, they have a Okay rating, right, they're still in the top 100. That's not great. You'd like at this point a team to be in the top 20 defensively, but they face the toughest schedule of opposing offenses this season right there. Ordinal is literally one next to that. But what that does is sometimes it gives you more credit for kind of just doing okay, right when it's like a degree of difficulty type thing, right, your, you know, pick your favorite degree of difficulty sport. You know, I know you're a big figure skating guy, we talked about that in the Olympics podcast, you love it. I'll use diving for an example, right, you do a really tricky dive. And it's only okay, like, you're gonna get a decent score because you try to tricky dive. It's the same thing with Michigan's defense this season, they've played a tough schedule of offenses. So just not giving up 100 points becomes a little bit more impressive. So I actually think the defense might be worse than the sort of 8090 range in the country that they are, especially when I'm I testing it, and I'm watching that, you know, they're not necessarily protecting the rim, they are giving up three pointers. They obviously had a good plan for Vescovi against Tennessee. But like Villanova is the type of team that a bunch of different guys are going to be able to beat you. Right? Because they create that open shot. They play kind of like a mid major where you and I talked about just creating open shots. Only they have the talent of a, you know, major program, right and obviously, if there's a massive coaching discrepancy or potentially between Jay Wright and Juwan Howard, again, but you know, it's Michigan and they're going to sort of kind of muck it up a little bit as far as like the James Gibson, they're gonna get points where you don't really see them coming. But here's the key at this number. And I have this number minus four. Right. So I think there is actually a little bit of value on a technical basis on Michigan. But I grabbed Villanova minus four and a half at minus 115. I think every point is going to matter. And here's why the Wildcats are vying right now to be the best free throw shooting team in the history of college basketball, shooting, like at 2.7%, something along those lines from the free throw line. And so the points sort of matter a little bit less than this game. Because if this is a two point game late, then we're you know, we get to the free throw type situation in that last 30 seconds, there's a higher probability that Villanova is going to win this game by 567 points, then sort of any other random team, you know, I mean, so like it could be, it could be two points the entire game, and then all of a sudden, it goes to six, it goes to eight because a couple of missed shots by Michigan, and three throws get converted by Villanova, because there is a better chance they convert those free throws. So I think this line might be inflated because of that. That's why it's not four, it's four and a half or five, because of the free throws at the end wouldn't be a big deal. If it was a pickle, right? Wouldn't be a big deal if this was minus 10. But because it's in that sweet spot where free throws are going to be the difference a lot of the time, when we're talking about the probabilities, you know, we talk more about it and football and you're getting a you know, a half point on the other side of seven or something along those lines. This is kind of that where you're getting not the half point necessarily, you're getting the better team in the last 30 seconds, we always talk about, hey, you're betting on what happens in the first 39 minutes. And in the first 39 minutes plus five probably sounds like a pretty good idea on Michigan. But because that last minute skews the percentages of win probability against the point spread against this type of point spread. Then I'm gonna play Villanova it's not gonna be some massive crazy bet but this is going this is a bet single solitary bet for me at minus four and a half because one book had it up at minus four and a half for minus 115 I'll pay that extra five cents so to speak to get that half point in a key area when it comes to how good Villanova's free throw shooting is. Listen, I failed Villanova against Ohio State had the buckeyes had a bad break? With Kyle young speaking of concussions, right sort of re aggravating potentially back concussion that was a key element. But even then that team was within two three points. When Kyle Young was out, what was the issue couldn't make a shot towards the end, Villanova hit all their free throws, a two or three point game becomes a 10 point game in that situation, right? I think that same sort of thing as possible here. Obviously, the point guard situation for Michigan is a problem as well. So with those two things, kind of in conjunction, I like Villanova to win. And therefore because of their ability to close, I like them to cover here at minus four and a half or minus five and it lands on five and you push not a huge deal. Obviously a little bit disappointing, but certainly worth a bet. In my opinion.

Sheldon: 18:07

I'm just most interested to see whether at the end of the game Juwan. Howard is going to be pushing opponents or hugging opponents.

Matt: 18:16

You never know. By the way, if you like Michigan, I'm not going to tell it talk you off of it. You might as well hit the money line with it, I think right? Because I think there's just if you like them again, you're the only way you lose is not the only way you lose but the only way it matters is if this is sort of a last shot type of a game right? We're Villanova wins it at the buzzer by two or 312 or three points, right? Because like I said, otherwise, you're probably in trouble using that plus five, because they're going to cover this game a lot of the time at the free throw line. Yeah,

Sheldon: 18:46

and as we move on to number three, Texas Tech versus number two, Duke and a pig comm game as Coach K's farewell tour continues. And I gotta be honest here for a lot of different reasons. I'm on Texas Tech. And I know that the whole world, the refereeing world, the NCAA commissioners and that whole room of old white guys that put together the the bracket, like all of them will be rooting for Duke to go through and keep it moving. But this line is mega fishy to me. Because I feel like the whole world would be sitting here betting on Duke. And yet, that's not what the line is telling me. So that is I'm just based off those things. I'm going to Texas Tech here. What say you?

Matt: 19:33

They don't make movies like they used to show. They don't make movies like they used to, um, you and I have a certain age. We grew up in the 90s, late 90s I'll say just to give us you know, maybe tricking people into thinking we're a little bit younger. And honestly, if you're younger than we are, go back and grab a list of movies from the late 90s like dramas, that sort of thing. And you'll be surprised we can come up with and one of these movies that sort of has fallen into The radar is a movie called Primal Fear. And that's movie starring Richard Gere and Edward Norton sort of Edward Norton's kind of coming out party, if you will, as far as getting on people's radars as a really incredible dramatic actor. And the movie Primal Fear is a kind of, you know, that's titled appropriately, Richard Gere plays a lawyer who is charged with defending. And we're Norton, who is charged with the murder. And this sort of primal fear is that Edward Norton, in fact, committed the murder, but he plays this character that is very sort of shy, and you're like, how could this kid you know, do this murder, etc, etc, etc. And so, you know, I don't want to spoil it for anybody necessarily, but like, you know, you the whole movie is based on this concept of like, we kind of know what is going to happen here because of what the primal fear is. Well, when it comes to Duke and Texas Tech, you and I know what our primal fear is, this is the thing that we have seen coming since before the bracket came out. And certainly when the bracket came out, what did I say? I was like, I'm already pre angry about how this is going to end right. This is going to end with me with a bet on Texas Tech. I just said at the time, you know, probably have a couple of points here. That's not the case. And honestly, I don't think this number is wrong. So when you say sort of fishy, I push back on that a little bit because I have Texas Tech as a half point favorite. The market based on the point spread throughout the season would have it at about a pick them. So I was a little bit you know, again, tiny amounts surprised, you can literally measure your your level of surprise when this open Texas Tech minus one minus one and a half area, because it was about a half point. Too big. Right. And so like, that's not a ton, especially in that area, you know, this is different than the Villanova Michigan game where the pick them to minus one probably isn't going to come, you know, into fruition here as anything sort of big. So what we're worried about, we're gonna be worried about how the game will be officiated. Right, the Gonzaga do game is the inevitability. And so you're sitting, you're going, alright, am I going to push up against this inevitability, push up against our primal fear? Or are we going to lean into it? And the answer is kind of both actually. Right? And so the people who are saying, Hey, man, like, okay, I get the I get the reference and all of that sort of thing. But, you know, you don't really think these games are fixed in any kind of a way. And I would say, like, No, not really. But the committee didn't have to put Duke as the two seat in the West, right? Like, that wasn't like some qualification, where if you finish first in the ACC, you go to the west to be in the second tee. It's like no, like you said, a bunch of people in the committee stood around for multiple days. And we're like, you know, it'd be cool. Gonzaga Duke and the regional final. They did and it's and you can't tell me that oh, man, like they just accidentally Oh, wait, oh, oh, I guess they would fit face each other if they were in this region. This is a group that three weeks earlier, put out there for seeds in each region as sort of a preview. So they're already thinking in terms of the top four seeds, ie who would play each other in the sweet 16 Who would play each other in the regional final, and I would throw you one more year shell. They didn't need to put Texas Tech as the three seed in the West either. But where does Texas Tech rate in the hierarchy of college basketball from like a blue blood program type of thing. Not particularly high. Unfortunately for Texas Tech. We just watched Chris Beard, leave Texas Tech to go to Texas. If this was Texas, they wouldn't have gotten thrown to the wolves. Right. Purdue didn't get thrown to the wolves here. Right, Texas Tech got thrown to the wolves. Villanova didn't get thrown to the wolves. Tennessee didn't get thrown to the wolves. Not even Wisconsin got thrown to the wolves, so to speak. Texas Tech is a team that in the NCAA committee's opinion, is disposable. And they've already gotten their final four appearance. So like who cares? Not a big deal. They're going to screw them here some way whether it's just putting them in the in the group with Duke and Gonzaga or actually doing it on the court. Now I get all of that is Primal Fear conspiracy, the thing that we're worried about, we don't know if that's going to be the case, because by the way, Texas Tech might play so well. That none of this matters, that they overcome the quote unquote, five on eight, right? That type of thing. And so I look at this and I go okay, how is this game going to look? If we get we are the Richard Gere. So, you know, in this situation, what are we going to have to look for? To find out whether or not Edward Norton ie this basketball game is the killer Well, it's going to be Texas Tech up early, right juke starts getting some calls. And again that you know, you always watch these basketball games because like, man feels like this team should be up 12 or 15, it feels like this should be a big time blowout or a big lead. And you look up at it's like, eight, right? And then Duke hits a three and it's down to five. And you're like, How is this a five point game like Texas Tech is all over and it's dunks, it's defensive, plays right? Block steals all of a sudden, and you look up and you're like, how, how did we get here. And so those calls start to add up, right, the foul start to add up, maybe the, the Duke gets into the bonus early, right? It's and it sort of innocuous because the sketchy foul calls are touch fouls, arm bars, that kind of thing. It isn't blatant, right. And maybe a couple of calls that don't go Texas Tech's way turn into, you know, obviously defensive stops for Duke. And it starts to add up. I look at this as something where Duke Live, makes a ton of sense to me. Once the I don't want it again, we'll put it in the in sort of the sketchiest way possible here. Once the fix is in, that's when you want to play Duke. Because if Duke just runs off with it, and they are the better team, because let's be honest, these are two evenly matched teams, they could both just run away with this game. In theory, I happen to think that Texas Tech has the better chance, if you told me one of these teams wins by 15 points, I would guess it would be Texas Tech, when Duke loses in the tournament, it's often with a bang, it is often with a flourish, it is often a relatively convincing win. For the other team, you think of South Carolina, you think of Oregon, those sorts of games where they get to the Sweet 16. And it's over, right, they win tight a lot of the time. So what I'm gonna do here is I'm gonna play this in a very specific way, I'm gonna start with the Red Raiders at pick them, I'm gonna make that bet for a single unit. Because if they are the better team, and if nothing that anybody can do to influence the outcome of this game can influence it because they are just that good. Then Texas Tech's just going to win the game, they're just going to win this game relatively comfortably. However, what I'm also going to do is I'm going to look for a spot to bet Duke. And I'm going to look for spot to bet Duke. And hopefully, if you can parlay things live Duke and the over Duke, or the over Duke and the over separately, anything along those lines, I think works because you're going to have to and what we're going to have to look for here is obviously those fouls starting to creep up, right, that's the number that I'm going to be watching in this game outside of the score. Okay, that's up to five or up to 5000, the first five minutes and the first seven minutes, something along those lines, where you go, man, Duke, there's a very good chance Dukes gonna shoot free throws here for the last eight minutes of the first half, something along those lines. So if we're sitting there with a Texas Tech bet, and Duke just takes the lead, then we're just going to be hoping Texas Tech makes a comeback and wins the game. If we're not, then we're going to sort of try to middle this thing. Or we're going to look for a plus four and a half a plus five and a half, something along those lines with Duke to take some of the edge off of our Texas Tech bet thinking that okay, man, like, this game should be out of hand. But it's not like that type of a situation. So we're going to start with the Red Raiders make that bet when you can, I would wait until tip off because you can you can see the Duke money starting to pile up here a little bit, not in any sort of massive way. But they're going to be the favorite amongst the betting community. And that's going to move the line, I could see this even closing Duke minus one by the time tip off it. But if it doesn't pick them, that's fine, right? But they're just worth waiting to see if you can get the best price. And then again, if the defense overwhelms, okay, that's fine. We're good to go with a Raiders wire to wire win here. But if it's close find the spot to get points. Since Texas Tech can go they can go dry on offense, right? They they're shooting you know, their offense isn't particularly great. They can go a five minute period with nobody else's help. Right, they can go a five minute period without scoring. And so Duke might not win this game. But they're going to be given every opportunity to win this game to set up the Gonzaga Duke matchup in the regional final

Sheldon: 29:18

that's going to be a great game either way because it's going to be just drama, drama, drama drama, despite whatever the outcome ends up being but another great game as well will be number five Houston vs Number One Arizona Arizona favorite by to in this game and I look at this and I just think you know it's a Houston we talked about Houston from the start of the bracket season. I'll call I'll call it and looked at this matchup as a potential upset a potential way for you to win your bracket. And we're here so I'm still going to be on Houston and you're going to give me a couple points. Why not?

Matt: 29:57

Yeah, well in the bracket contest right like We talked about this this is one of our sort of framework picks a man I'm looking at the bracket right now and I you know, we did this show on Monday morning. And you know, we're sort of living in the in the throes of what happened from a betting standpoint, etc, etc. And I'm looking at the bracket and I'm just like, man, what an opportunity lost here, right? Because between North Carolina, you know, we had them going through into the sweet 16 and that sort of, you know, something of a difference maker, Iowa State coming through into the sweet 16 That's something of a difference maker. There's a couple here obviously that is like, man, we should have known better Villanova Michigan, for example, as you know, as a, something that's a little bit choppier. But I just looked at I go man outside of the USC Miami discussion and the Kentucky just gashing. The whole thing, if either of those two games USC or my end Miami if USC wins that game, because again, I'll go to my grave saying that Auburn was going to lose that second round game, to whomever they played either one of those teams, or if stupid, Kentucky hadn't had one, maybe the worst upset, certainly in school history, maybe in tournament history, like I would, I would have a fun time sort of debating that. If either of those things go through, I'm sitting pretty man, I'm loving my bracket. But those two things don't happen. And that's the sort of nice edge that you're on, because of how 5050 A lot of these games are. And so the point is, you mentioned, this is a situation where it's like, oh, man, if two teams are kind of rated equal, like take the plus two, it comes to bracket contests, the final numbers on ESPN who picks you on their tournament challenge 67% of the population have Arizona winning this game 14% have Houston winning this game, obviously, the leftover percent being the chances of Illinois or UAB or one of these other teams, right? Getting through because obviously the brackets put out before the tournament starts. But you're sitting here and you're sitting, you know, for those poker, you know, enthusiast outs out there, that's like, what five to one, right? You're getting five to one on your money, so to speak here on a game that you're a two point underdog. So again, when we talk about this, and we tried it, we do our best to project it and we talked about how Arizona would be a small favorite. And maybe people thought, you know, four or five points, something like that. I think we quoted two points because this again, is very in line with where the market numbers are actually in Arizona is a little bit inflated here, which is going to cause me to bet on Houston one because I don't have this implicit value because my brackets dead. But two because getting two points with Houston that Houston team that nobody seemed to have any sort of credit for as they were talking about UAB as a team that could possibly upset this and then it takes like a weekend of people actually watch watching Houston I understand why I don't watch Houston. Houston's a tough team to watch literally because it's hard to find their games. You know, they're always sort of an ESPN to afterthought when there's a big time big 10 or SEC game on ESPN proper, like people aren't going to watch the 15 point beatdown that Houston's gonna lay on like Central Florida on a Wednesday night, right? They're not going to get locked into the American Conference tournament. Because again, it's Houston beat down Houston beat down and then a game against Memphis, right. And even then it competes against a quote unquote, better game with the SEC tournament going on, or the big 10 tournament going on the championship game going on. But then you watch them for two days, you're like, oh, man, this Houston team is legit. And it's like, yeah, that's what we're trying to tell you. That's what the metrics are trying to tell you. So now we've paired the metrics of this team that is literally ranked second in the country. Right now. I'm Ken Pom, with the eye test of watching them just adult, UAB and Illinois in back to back games. And then you compare it with Arizona playing against TCU. A team that is also an adult like the Horned Frogs. And that bait again, it's the big 12 Like this is a legit conference that plays man basketball every single night. And you go, man, it was really rough for Arizona against TCU that isn't adult T but also isn't remotely as talented as Houston. And so the thing to you know, remind yourself is going forward comes the bracket thing, obviously strategy, but also that your seed is your resume. In these tournaments. The seed is not your talent, the seed is not the quality of the team. So when a team is the fifth seeded team, it's based on what they did resume wise and that we can hide the metrics all we want, but the Met the resume didn't look particularly good for Houston because there wasn't a ton of opportunities for it to look good. Speaking of a team who could use an upgrade to say the big 12 for example. And, you know, so it's like okay, well, if we're not rating these teams by the quality, then there's going to be opportunities here for quote unquote upsets. So from a basketball standpoint, okay, how is this upset happened with Houston? Well, to me, it's how many extra possessions are Houston Houston going to create? Arizona's fifth in the country in tempo? Houston is 330/3 in tempo, they are going to drag this game into the mud Part of the reason why their tempo is such is because they have a lot of long offensive possessions because they get offensive rebounds. When you're saying well, okay, Arizona, that's a couple of big guys out there, they're going to give up these offensive rebounds. 20 offensive rebounds given up against TCU TCU on Sunday. So they're just going to get that fixed. They're just going to get that figured out for Houston, the biggest offensively boarding team in the country, essentially, at least from a strategic standpoint. So I'm just looking at this and I go, okay, coaching matchup, Kelvin, since Sampson can slow this game down, I trust him to play this game. Have this game played at the tempo and the way that he wants to have it played. I don't trust Tommy Lloyd. At this point, there's a decent chance Tommy Lloyd is the greatest recruiter in the country, right, scanning the globe for players for Mark few at Gonzaga. And then immediately in impressively scanning the globe for players for Arizona and putting together this team that is super fun to watch, and has everything you'd ever want from a team right? Even when Kirk Reese is not shooting the ball. Well, you know, it's looks a lot better when he's on fire. Because it's like, how do you how do you beat this team? And by the way, how do you beat this team of Kirk Reese's shooting the ball? Well, because you're pairing that with the big guys down low. And Benedict Matheran and all of the other guys, you know, like, if there's eight guys on this team that can beat you. Problem is you only can play five at a time. And so the decision is okay, how much Carissa are we going to play here? Are we going to let him shoot us out of the game if he's going to miss his first five threes, if he's going to have the performance that he had against UCLA on the road earlier this year where he couldn't make a shot? Or is he gonna have the performance against UCLA at home earlier this year? Because I wrote about this a couple months ago when they were going to go play Colorado and I predicted the Colorado was going to win that game outright. And so we grabbed the money line as a 10 point underdog 10 point home underdog to Arizona, because that road schedule wasn't all that tough this year for Arizona, right? Everything, a lot of their reputation, if you will, was built on home games at the Mikkelsen. And like that's a pretty great place to play, especially when things are rolling pretty well, because you get pretty hyped. And you can blow out some PAC 12 teams pretty quick. Now we find neutral site territory. And by the way, not even that neutral, because this game is being played in San Antonio, Texas. So Houston, in theory, is going to have at least a significant portion of the crowd who knows percentage wise, but it's certainly not going to be a home game for Arizona. And so I'm trusting Calvin Sampson here to slow this game down. I'm not trusting Tommy Lloyd. Because if there's only going to be 64 possessions per team, versus 72 possessions per team, and in that sort of tighter span of possessions, the possessions for Houston are going to be longer because of the offensive rebounds. The defense is going to get tired here for Arizona. Right? That's how Euston plays. That's why the last 10 minutes against Illinois look the way that it looked. Right because Illinois was just like I can't do this any longer. I did this for 30 minutes, I can't do much more like we hung in. We were tied with what 10 minutes to go something along those lines. And then it just kind of fell apart at the end it didn't just kind of fell apart again. At the end. This was by design for Houston. So can Arizona survive crease and missing? I don't really think they can. And are we expecting a guy like loco to start the game nine for nine or 10 for 10 the way that he did against TCU which is the only thing by the way that kept Arizona in that game is that they got whatever they wanted in the first half from Colorado. Not going to happen against Houston it's just not going to happen. So I have this number Houston minus a half. Right a lot of that obviously stemming from Ken POM having them rated higher than Arizona in his ratings and so to me you're getting to three points now is that going to matter? Who knows because like we said the shooting is going to be the difference maker right crease a hits a bunch of threes Mathur and hit some threes all you know the assortment of other guys right tubules can do that. Whatever whatever. I just I've had Houston in this game since before the tournament started. I'm getting two points that I think I don't necessarily deserve in this game or money line. This is a game by the way that I don't see if you lose the spread. Or if you win the spread it's not going to be because Houston won this game by a point or Houston won this game by two if you got me found a two and a half something along those lines. I think this is a game that if Houston's good enough and it goes their way they win the game. So I'm going to grab plus 110 on the money line. I'm not going to play the spread even though so I'm going to from a value standpoint it isn't that I'm getting two extra points. It's that I'm getting 20 extra cents so instead of getting a minus 110 bet. I'm getting a plus 110 bet. And listen if I was getting plus 110 bets on things that I thought you'd be minus 110 My whole life. I, I be a sportsbook, right because that's how they play. So I'm, I'm all over Houston, this is probably my biggest bet of the week here. This is the one that I'm willing to go down sort of firing here, so to speak as something that I've had targeted for a week plus now, and that I'm going to keep playing here, you know, with reckless abandon, if you will.

Sheldon: 40:29

Well, speaking of going down, there's a team that has refused to go down despite being a number 15 seat as we move on to Friday's games, and we're talking about St. Peter's, they will take on number three, see Purdue Purdue favorite by 12 and a half points, and I get it. It's a lot of points. It's a lot of points, but I just refuse to believe that people actually know much about St. Peter's. So give me the points.

Matt: 40:54

Okay. Okay, fair. And man to things take a steep fall from Thursday to Friday from a game quality standpoint. But again, that's what's gonna happen when a 15 seed finds its way into the sweet 16. But listen, there's a couple others here that aren't necessarily that, you know, rated that badly where the game could be relatively grim. Okay, so here's the situation here. A couple of different things here. One, there is reason to believe that minus 12 and a half isn't high enough for Purdue. Based on and you don't have to go that far back, right, like Murray State was eight point favorites, right. Kentucky was I think, what they opened 15 and a half, and that went to 1717 and a half, something along those lines, right? And would Kentucky be a five point favorite against Purdue? No, I think that would be closer to three, three and a half. So there actually might be a couple of points of value here on Purdue. Why? Because St. Peters has played pretty well over the last couple of games, right, obviously, and even going back into the metro, Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference tournament. So that's why this number is starting to drop here a little bit. Now, because they have played so well, their metrics have gone up. And I'm not even really all that positive that Purdue has played all that well, I think their metrics actually may have gone a little bit down. So my number just from, you know, the pure basketball metric standpoint, as actually a little bit lower than 12 and a half. So there's actually a pretty big disparity. And that's why this number is fallen in the middle, right, when you know, as much as I like it, so to speak, when my number lands exactly what my number is, or where there's a you know, very obvious reason why I'm getting value. It's also kind of fun to see okay, market thinks is probably should be about 14, based on history, historical point spreads, I think this probably should be about 11. And it lands directly in the middle. So who am I going to go with here, right? I'm probably going to go with the market in this situation, because I know it's gone into my number coming down. And that St. Peter's beating Kentucky playing pretty well overcoming a shot quality disparity, but that's the thing that I can't shake, I can't shake the back game was a fluke upon fluke. Now, again, they ended up beating Murray State. So that, you know, obviously confirms that St. Peters is not a fluke. But in that game, right is, you know, different for a fork in the road different paths. There's a lot of different times IE 98% of the time where we never see St. Peter's play Murray State and they never get that opportunity, because they were supposed to win that game 2% of the time, against Kentucky, which obviously, you know, before, during and after, outside of the scoreboard makes ton of sense, right? You are a 18 point underdog, you're probably expected to win that game about 2% of the time, right? Obviously, the money line being what 22 was something along those lines. So I look at this game and I go okay, for a number standpoint, I can see why I could be higher, but I also could see why the number is what it is. Then I go into the history of these types of teams with these upsets the Florida Gulf Coast's of the world right, the UMB seas of the world. No UMBC didn't even make the sweet 16 They ended up getting blown out the very next day. Well, the two days later against Kansas State. Right. A team ended up going to believe the late that year in part because they didn't have to face Virginia, a full strength Virginia in the second round. By the way, nobody absolutely nobody talks about Virginia not playing that game with you know, playing that game without DeAndre Hunter. That year. Right? Everybody talks about that, oh, 116, Virginia, all fools like Well, they didn't have their best player, right? Nobody ever talks about that small introduction. So I look at the history and I go, okay, these teams do get blown out especially, you know, if they ride the wave of that first weekend, right, and obviously they're playing Murray State, a team not as accomplished as Kentucky. It's kind of I don't wanna say easy but it's kind of easy. To ride that wave that weekend, now they've gone home. They've had the celebration, right? Like there's practically been a parade in Jersey City at this point for this team. They've done all the media that Pat's on the back, you know, I talked about it all the time. college sports, right. And you get that pat on the back week, right? There's going to be a slip up on the other side. I don't think this team really thinks that they can win the national championship. Right? I mean, maybe they do. Maybe they're completely deranged. But this matchup actually, I think presents a bigger problem than the Kentucky matchup. And again, the Kentucky matchup produced a game that from a shot quality standpoint, should have been about a 22 point Kentucky victory. Thing is what Kentucky is you've got Oscar Shibu, who is an amazing player, but part of his amazingness is as an undersized five, he's able to rebound 20 boards a game basically right? He's able to just get the ball wherever it's happened. But like, you can work your way around a guy like that. You can't work your way around Zach Ed and treyvion. Williams down in the post, right? And yes, like St. Peters has like some Okay, post players and I shouldn't say okay, that's not good enough. Very good post players post defenders, but like we're talking about, we're talking about some size, right, some width and treyvion Williams and some height and some width with Zach Ed. And by the way, that's not the only issue. The issue is the size on the perimeter as well. Who on St. Peters is guarding Jaden. Ivey because again, there's nobody on Kentucky that looks like Jaden Ivey, right there sort of pieces where you're like, Okay, he's a couple inches shorter. Oh, this guy's pretty quick, right, severe Wheeler for all his quickness, right, doesn't provide a size mismatch. Even tie tie, Washington doesn't provide a size mangement mismatch. Jamie Ivey, right is like, has Jama rant potential here, and you're sticking a size mismatch down low with that mismatch on the outside. And by the way, even like the two and the three and the other, you know, the other guys I don't Purdue are all bigger than St. Peters. And so offensively This is a team that's much better than Kentucky, Purdue in Purdue. Defensively, they're not. But we've seen it start to ramp up here a little bit in that Texas Game, I was actually kind of impressed with Purdue's defense. Now. Nobody wants to give them any credit. And I certainly don't want to give them much credit because they shot 46 Free throws in that game. But Texas had absolutely no idea what to do on defense was actually like a change of pace here for Purdue. And so I just go okay, this is the St. Peter's team that the issue in whether they could even cover the spread against Kentucky was could they generate enough offense? So it's kind of a bad matchup in that it's a bad offensive team going up against a bad defensive team that by the way, defense, lots about Effort, Right lot of defenses about effort, produce seems to sort of decided to turn it on at this point in the season here, and they've got a few more games maybe that you know, maybe maybe it's IV, maybe IV is more interested in playing defense, maybe it's less davantage out there, right? Because that you've seen different different sort of designated shooters, if you will, playing instead of defensive edge. I just look at this and I go, this is all great the story, but how many times do we get sort of sucked into getting all the points with the Cinderella story, and then we look up, and it's 25 to 10 in the first half, and you go, okay, mood might cover this game. But we're going to be hanging on for dear life here for the next 30 minutes, and trying to win the next 30 minutes. And it might not necessarily work out. It's a dicey thing here because this could be a blowout game, this could be a game that's 18 points for, you know, through 38 minutes, 39 minutes. And in the end, maybe St. Peters makes a couple shots, and Purdue could care less because, you know, to 11 or 12 point victory. I'm going to make a bet on Purdue here. I think they absolutely overwhelm the St. Peter's team that has accomplished anything they possibly could have dreamed of, from an accomplishment standpoint, and nothing can take that away from them. I think we're gonna see Shaheen Holloway, you know, headed straight to Seton Hall after this game, which is you know, that sort of disappointing element where we're probably never going to see St. Peters again, if we're being completely truthful. It's just one of those things that we see it every year and we forget about it, and it's like, Have you heard of Florida Gulf Coast? You know, since ANDY ENFIELD went to USC? No, you haven't. And it's just one of these teams UMBC you know, just lost by 42 Vermont in their conference tournament final ever the world goes back on its axis right? And so it got tilted a little bit when St. Peters beat Kentucky and obviously pulled off that win against Murray State more power to him. Purdue is just going to be too much here.

Sheldon: 49:51

Fair enough. Fair enough. Next matchup were point spreads kind of getting up there but it's still only at seven and a half is you have Kansas, who are favored against providence in Providence has been an interesting team to look at so far. And I mean, a lot of discussion about what kind of team Providence is. But I feel like I kind of know who Kansas is. And it's tough, but I will lay the seven and a half points here.

Matt: 50:16

Okay, I don't begrudge you that I don't know that I'm necessarily going to have a bet on this. I would certainly love it. If Kansas comfortably won this game, my first and not only but my only future bet from before the season, or amongst the season starting, you know, watching the champions classic in that first week, was on Kansas at 21. To win the national title. I was like, we're not getting better. We're not getting better than this. On this Kansas team, they have all the pieces. So let's just grab some 20 to one and sort of see what happens, right? And of course, you add to that, obviously, couple months before the tournament before the tournament, we do all this stuff. We're gonna talk about Arkansas final for all of that stuff. And you're like, yeah, the best bet the entire time was a bet I made back in November, right? And it's like, Man, why do I bother with some of this other stuff that's all just kind of going red as the Kentucky's of the world get upset. Now maybe Kansas gets upset here. It's funny people talk about Bill Self as this guy who's like, can't handle it can't handle his business. If he didn't as if he did not make a final for like, what three years ago when they lost to an incredibly stacked Villanova team. Obviously, I'm a little bit frightened by providence. This is you know, when you have that ordinal that number one ordinal under the luck category, which of course everyone has made everything out of at this point. But these points spreads based on the metrics have always been fair to Providence, right? And seven and a half is a fair number as well. I will say that both of these teams, though from like an inherent style results, the type of a way, it just feel like this is going to be a little bit closer, because Kansas was a team all throughout the big 12 That, you know, they'd win a ton of games, but there was a lot of highly line's games that came down to, you know, a bucket, maybe some overtime, right, you'll recall that overtime game before the Coach K parade. Towards the end of the season, that wasn't an unusual type of a result for Kansas where they were six point favorites, finding themselves in overtime or finding themselves in a last shot type of situation, even as 789 10 point favorites. That was the case a lot of the time, as well. I mean, while you have this Providence team, that's tough to figure out five guys scoring basically in double digits. So it's hard to know what to expect beyond the luck. It's just sort of like, you know, and I don't know that the luck element is built into this, but it's like, okay, we don't love anybody. There isn't one guy with like a cool nickname or anything on this team, where you're like, oh, man, like that's the guy is going to get the bucket in the end. But if every one of them is going to sort of produce to a certain level, and be really consistent, you are going to find yourself in a lot of close games. And the luck element stems from when Providence was winning those close games, right, like that's what they got credit for. They got credit for winning close games. And there were some times where they got blown out Creighton and I think Creighton twice if I'm not mistaken. I just look at this and I go man, I don't know that I'm that comfortable laying points with Kansas. I faded them I found the middle i against Creighton right once but Creighton got to a 13 point spread this past weekend because Ryan Kalkbrenner was out. And it was like okay, we're going that far to a plus 13. Like that was a classic injury over overreaction. So I knew that I could probably find the middle in between Kansas advancing and create and covering 13, obviously, seven and a half a lot trickier for me in this situation. But one thing that I would maybe do is I think if Providence competes in this game from a pointspread standpoint, I think the game kind of has to go over because the numbers 141 Right now, and Kansas has to defend in order to cover that number, right. We talked about whether it's football or basketball in order to cover a big point spread. It's not the offense that needs to be awesome. The defense is what needs to be awesome. The defense needs allow the offense to be able to extend the lead, Kansas is defense. Not that awesome, right? We just talked about creating without Cochran being able to score just enough against Kansas. So if Providence is able to score just enough, then I think the game has to go over because I think Kansas does score against Providence, right? I think they score a ton actually. And so I think this game sort of gets to a point where both teams are scoring. And we end up looking at something that's 7570 7970 You know, it means something along those lines, where if we're going to be sweating, maybe free throws at the end of the game, right that last minute or so. I'd rather be sweating it at like plus 300 with a parlay of those two with a correlated parlay of the over and Providence versus just Providence Right now, again, if you think that Kansas defends, and that Providence can't keep up offensively, and that listen, as much as we give them credit for winning two games and getting to the Sweet 16, super tired Richmond, and South Dakota State who is in the tournament basically every year and never does anything, right, like, let's temper our enthusiasm when it comes to Providence. Now those two games being relatively easy. I mean, that's what you want. If you're Providence, that's what you want. When you go into a tournament next round, you don't want to be exhausted because you played these like rough games, like both those games are all you know, basically over close to it with 10 or five minutes to go. So I can't if there's a way to play it, I think it's Providence plus seven and a half correlated to the overthrow those together in a parlay and sweat those because I don't think those are, you know, they're going to be priced like a parlay should be priced. But they're not, you know, the wind probability isn't going to be that right. So if it's priced like a 25% outcome, I think the outcomes closer to like 40% In that situation, whereas with this number at seven and a half, honestly, I think it's 5050 on either side.

Sheldon: 56:09

I gotcha. I gotcha. What about North Carolina, the eight seed they take on UCLA, the four seed UCLA favored by two and a half points here. I look at this line in North Carolina, we wondered what kind of vibe they would be on heading into the tournament after coming out with some big wins. And they've been kind of rolling, whereas UCLA, they've been looking, okay, they've been looking at right. And this is an interesting, interesting matchup, but at the two and a half points. I mean, I was ready to just take UCLA in this show the way that North Carolina is rolling. It's making me really think about taking the two and a half points here.

Matt: 56:48

Yeah, it's scary. Right. But like, isn't that UCLA? Where it's like, yeah, they just lucked out, right? They just they kind of done like, I'm not really sure that like, they're awesome. But like, they won the game. And like Mick Cronin, like is still looking angry, even though they won the game. And you're just sort of going like, Man, this seems kind of kind of weird. And we've, we've experienced this team for, you know, two years now. Right? Like they've been on our radar for, you know, for that long time. Um, a couple of things here. So one, obviously, the big thing is Jaime hoch as his injury, who I'm always mixing up with Johnny Giussani, because they both have JJ names. And they both play basically the same kind of style where they're somehow making but you know, two pointers from a step inside of the three point line. And you're sort of just going like, why don't you just take a step back, but the bucket went in, so nobody cares. First of all, like, Yes, his hockey is going to play, you know, they talk about how he didn't practice yesterday, and people are taking videos of him like getting on and off the bus. And walking around. Is he like always ginger, like, yeah, he's walking a little gingerly and he didn't practice but like they say he's going to play. And it helps obviously, that they're playing the late game on Friday. The thing is, to me, like it matters what the price is, oh, it shouldn't say it matters. But it's interesting to me what the price is going to be because this line fell down to around UCLA, like minus one with a little extra juice, but like more of a flat minus one and a half. Because earlier in the week, you know, people go like Oh Hawk, as you know, might not play so long comes down a little bit. Then it starts to circulate the crone and saying oh, he's gonna have to have two broken legs for him not to play. So the line starts moving up. And now we've got it to two and a half now. And you start to feel like oh, man, maybe I missed the boat. When it comes to the best of the number and like, yes, that that is technically the case. But if that number is minus one and a half, and hawk has isn't playing, then like, what did you really miss? Versus okay, if he is playing, and he's fully healthy, what? What should that number be? My season long market number. And keep in mind, this is a season of people not having a ton of respect for North Carolina. This is a season where they were 11 Point underdogs on the road, Duke, which like, again, these are the bats, right, that when we look back, we go How did we not just absolutely house, North Carolina plus 11, just on value alone, these are the things that we were if we were incredibly selective in our betting, we would have just bet that game that week, and done nothing else, because that was the best value on the board. So my season long number, being five for UCLA, shouldn't be all that surprising. But it also shouldn't be taken, you know, with any level of gospel because we didn't think that much of North Carolina, my true number, my sort of metric induced number here is three. So you're still getting a little bit of value at two and a half. And you're while you're getting a little value at two and a half, because hawk has is questionable right? So again, it's if he plays and you know, you see him on the court in warm ups and he's running around. I expect this number to go closer to what my fair number is, which is three or even through that we talked about with producers have something in the middle. I wouldn't be stunned if it went to four with a fully healthy high Mohawk is. So from a number standpoint like yeah, like we get it we should still be getting it while it's hot when it comes to UCLA minus two and a half if you can get a minus two, absolutely grab that from an encore basketball standpoint, right? North Carolina in those first two games, right they wiped the floor with Mark yet and then until things got mega weird with, you know, objections and weird calls and Baylor's showing heart of the champion and all of that stuff. North Carolina was wiping the floor with Baylor three of Excuse me 13 of 35 from the three point line against Marquette along with 52 rebounds in that game for North Carolina. We know North Carolina is going to rebound. That's their whole premise of the program is rebound, rebound, rebound, get extra, you know, don't give up extra possessions get extra possessions. Very next game against Baylor 11 of 25. So 44% shooting the three and 47 rebounds. If North Carolina is going to morph into this team that shoots 40% from the three point line, and racks up 50 rebounds a game. Then the gym is done. North Carolina is going to win the title. But what's more likely that they have morphed into this team or that they found a nice arena that they liked playing in for a weekend and they like to match up the reason we like North Carolina against Baylor is because we liked the matchup right Baylor having suffered some injuries right Jonathan Shaw muchacho not being in the lineup. That's gonna be a problem for a guy like Armando Bacot. Or I should say it's great news for Armando Bacot. But for guarding Armando Bacot that's gonna be a problem and guess who was really good in that game? Armando Baker? All right. And a couple other defensive matchups it's obviously not the Baylor have passed, the metrics look good defensively for Baylor, but they're still gonna play you at a at a sort of above average pace, right, their guards gonna get up and down the floor here. North Carolina is going to do the same thing. And so we go okay, if they're playing North Carolina's game, then like, I like North Carolina to potentially win this game, especially especially at a value of like plus 200 plus 250. Ish. Somewhere in between there. I forget what the price was, I think was closer to plus 200. Against Baylor. Here's the thing, like we just talked about with UCLA, what type of game do they play, they play at a more controlled pace. They play the grimy Mick Cronin style of basketball, right? Where it's like, you're only you're going to get a contested shot, right, you're not going to get those open threes, you're gonna get a contested shot, you're going to get contested rebounds, you're going to get, you know, the Bruins crashing the offensive glass, you get the Bruins playing sort of this relatively conservative style, where it's like, Okay, we're gonna play a 5450 We're not going to play a 7470. And so I look at Mark a game against Marquette being like, man, that's actually a really great matchup for North Carolina, but it is North Carolina, they could screw it up. And I look at it all man, circle, that one Baylor against North Carolina. But then whether it was going to be St. Mary's or UCLA, two teams that will run sort of pristine, just pristine basketball, both defensively and offensively. Like that's going to be problematic for UNC. And so this is sort of very similar to the Houston thing where it's like, I had this pegged, I'm not going to get overly excited by what I saw from North Carolina because of two good matchups in a hot shooting weekend. Now, we talked about air, Arkansas, and college kids, is it going to turn from one weekend to the next? And how often it does, I think that could be the case in a negative way here for North Carolina, as they you know, in the in the what the south region and where it what regions is the east region in the east region, right, they're going from relatively comfortable shooting environment here to now it started, you know, going to be a little bit rougher to get, you know, open shot with UCLA. So I don't know that I'm looking to wait any longer here. I do want to know more about hakase. Because if he's out in this line goes to minus one. I think that matters, but it's going to be built into the point spread because if I think the point spread should be three or four. And Hawkins is out and it goes down to one then I don't have to worry about the Hopkins thing because it's already been built into the point spread. So I just kind of want to know more about what what the deal is with him and I almost kind of shouldn't say it this way but I kind of prefer the minus one or even pick them without Hotez then I do minus three or minus four with him in you know I mean because I think UCLA still wins the game without him. I just you know obviously rather not have to lay the points but I will lay the points here I will figure out the right market time. Keep your ear to the ground here when it comes to hawk as you know matchup wise we mentioned Bacot one final thing here. Cody Riley and Miles Johnson basically never played together. It's funny how their their minutes literally add up to 40. Sometimes you'll get overlap where it's like Zach, Ed plays, you know, 25 minutes and so does treyvion Williams, because sometimes they play together and like, rarely looks all that great. micron is like, no, these two guys are never going to see the court at the same time. But the point is, is miles Johnson who plays you know, I think 16 minutes or so, he only plays 16 minutes or so because Cody Riley is on the team. So if Cody Riley got into foul trouble, for example, guarding Bay caught, they have another guy who can play 20 to 25 minutes, he just doesn't based on circumstance. Whereas on the flip side, if Bacot gets into foul trouble. Well, what's the other option? Right there kind of isn't one because you've seen McCoy come in for North Carolina. And whether it was him having to play against Duke when Baker got in foul trouble in the first half. And you see you watch that game again, whether it was that game against Duke, or whether it was the game where you had to come in and play because of all the foul trouble against Baylor, you're sitting there going like, this is not the game for this gentleman, this guy cannot play in this game in an effective way. UCLA doesn't have that issue. North Carolina might have that issue where they have to spell Bacot for even a couple of minutes. I don't like that when it comes to him dealing with Cody Riley, and then miles Johnson and never getting that break, right? Never getting the backup center in sort of, you know, obviously, miles Johnson's a backup center in name only. But he certainly wasn't at Rutgers last year when they were this close to beating Houston and advancing. But I digress. So again, I think tough matchup here from stylistic and personnel wise here for North Carolina, the really only question mark is going to be where our market entry is, whether that's going to be minus one or something better, when Jeff Hawkins gets ruled out doesn't seem like he's going to be ruled out. So maybe two and a half is going to be the play that we're just gonna have to make here on UCLA.

Sheldon: 1:06:57

And to wrap things up here, we got the 11, seated Iowa State at 10. Seed Miami, just amazing when you see to double digit seeds going at it. But Miami favored by two and a half points here. They're both riding high, obviously winning the two games making it into the second weekend. But how do you see this game matching up here? Because I kind of want to ride with Iowa State in the points here. But I'm not confident in it. To be honest.

Matt: 1:07:28

I think the latter part of that statement is really more exciting than the former part of the statement, right? It's more I rather just take the points, then I rather bet on Iowa State like I know those two things are congruent, but like, I just want the points in this game and it two and a half. I think that's too many points. Frankly, my number is Iowa State minus one and it comes back to the idea that like Baylor, obviously leading the way in the big 12 conference and having that effort in the end against North Carolina, Kansas advancing TCU having the effort against Arizona, like the list of big 12 teams that have played really well is really long and like Iowa State being one of those teams and it's funny, right? Like your bracket looks all sexy when you've got the double digit matchup of UAB Chattanooga or Richmond and South Dakota State. Meanwhile, like in reality, the double digit matchup is pretty good team at one point was 12 No, I think in the big 12 I was state or from the big 12 I should say and I was state and Miami who at one point led the ACC this year had a road win against Duke like these two teams are double digit seeds only because we ran out of seeds not because that they are some like upstart program here. Now Iowa State can feel like an upstart program obviously a new coach in TJ altenburger. And listen, you know if I ride on a South Dakota State for never actually winning in the tournament, it's hard to get that excited about TJ also burger here. And as much as people give credit to Jim Larranaga, he's pulled it off again it's like yeah, I mean you won by two against USC when USC was just like handing you the ball the entire game. And then yeah, like you beat Auburn but again, I kind of felt like a lot of teams were going to beat Auburn and now they get a ton of credit and they're up to two and a half point favorites here and a game that I think at the very least is a pick them and now unlike some of these other two and a half point spreads here, particularly Arizona and Houston, where I go okay, I don't really care for the points because I don't think Arizona wins this game by one point if they win it, it's going to be by three 410 one whatever. This is one where I see it I could see it landing Miami by one Miami by to like a relatively high percentage of the time, because Iowa State's gonna grind this game up right I think a total might be even a little bit too high at 132 and a half, because I think this game is gonna get super grind Me, and points are going to make, you know a lot more of a difference. They're going to matter more here. So I think this is also you know, again, it's just a different game for Miami like, I was state's not going to play you the same way USC is because they're not going to turn the ball over a trillion times they're not going to jack shots, they're not going to try, you know, crazy plays, they're going to get into a gap. And they're going to take a short jumper. And they have guys who can make that right, Gabe kalscheur is obviously making some three pointers. But Isaiah Brockington as my guy when it comes to like a bucket getter type of a dude, when it comes to late game type situations, he is going to have the ball in his hand, whether he makes the shot or not, is probably going to decide whether Iowa State wins or loses this game. But I think it comes down to that last shot. And when I look at Miami, I'm trying to figure out who that guy is on the team. Now maybe it's Cameron McGuffey. Maybe it's Charlie more, but it feels like he is more, you know, should be more of a distributor type role situation. Isaiah Wong looked great against Auburn, there are days where Isaiah Wong looks like he's not really familiar with how basketball works, right? It's a lot of turnovers and get messy. I just look at this and I go, okay, like Iowa State feels like a more consistent expectation here from how they're going to play. Whereas Miami capable, right. And that's the idea capable of beating USC capable of beating or capable of beating Duke at Cameron, but honestly, also capable of losing to Syracuse. And they're what you know, it wasn't that long ago that they went to Syracuse. And they ended up pulling the game out, because Syracuse gave it away in epic fashion. But Syracuse was winning that game by double digits, right? They had a close game with Syracuse earlier on the season, they've had other losses, you can go down the list and be like, Man, that's kind of a shady loss. That's just where we're at with this Miami team, right. And they're playing really well. And it's why we liked them last week against Auburn. But we also liked USC against Auburn, we just basically hated Auburn. So again, I'm not going to go wild here and think that they should be favored. Now again, could they win this game, this could be a buzzer beater three, to win by three and we end up losing this could be Miami winning comfortably here because the sort of, you know, the fairy dust runs off on Iowa State, but I don't think it's fairy dust. I just think it's like, maybe they could have more talent on the team. And they will eventually build that talent back up from a team that was too. And whatever last year, part of that is bringing in a guy like Isaiah Brockington, right, this isn't the same group that only won two games last year. So yeah, I mean, do I love Iowa State in sort of an Iowa State type of way? Or do I love this game? And I'm getting plus two and a half points of a way. It's definitely the latter here. So give me the two and a half points with Iowa State. I don't think they necessarily need to win for you to win this bet, unlike a few others on in the sweet 16.

Sheldon: 1:12:45

Yeah, definitely. It's a weird one. And there's still time for me to talk myself into Miami if I'm being totally honest. But it's a very weird matchup. It's a very weird matchup for sure. And as we wrap up that sweet 16 there the tough part now is we got to wait to see the next time that we'll talk and we'll be able to break down those games because the messed up part about how this works from the gambling perspective. Is that who knows what happens in the sweet 16 years? Right? Like, yeah, we could be talking about so many different matchups that's going forward that it just makes me so excited to watch these games and move on to the next round after that. But my dude, if people wanted to catch up with you, figure out some lines figure out what your thoughts are post the sweet 16 matchups where would they be able to do that?

Matt: 1:13:35

Yeah, at Mrs. Authentic on Twitter, I can do some quick projections here. We'll see where it sort of lands. But I'll give out the picks for any any pics that I have for the Elite Eight when it happens. But think of it this way. Right? Gonzaga, I have both four points better than either Duke or Texas Tech. Some of these are relatively easy because I have Texas Tech and Duke rated equally. And so I think zag has got about four points on either of those teams. So we'll see what the point spread is anything less than four on Gonzaga and even for to be honest with you, barring obviously injuries, that sort of thing against either one of those teams. I'm going to be on Gonzaga in those games. Houston Arizona, right like two teams that we have rated really equally just because the point spread happens to be two doesn't mean I don't have them rated equally. Let's assume it's Villanova here again, I think we both think that they're the most likely team to win this game even if we may or may not be on opposite sides of the point spread. Houston should be about a three point favorite against Villanova. I would actually lean to take the points there if it was anything higher than that maybe Houston gets a little too much credit against Arizona and maybe we end up with a Houston my you know, three and a half four type situation if it's Michigan not complicated here either right? We talked about how Michigan don't over about a four point difference. So now we're talking about like a seven point difference between whomever they face right again, I use Houston as an example. But Arizona if they win that game, right I have Arizona minus Three to Villanova of Arizona minus seven to Michigan. The Kansas thing right same sort of deal Kansas is going if they win, again, heavily favored most likely, you know, opponent, Iowa State and Miami have them rated the same. I have Kansas about minus seven in that game. The funny thing here, right is Providence as the four seed is rated at the exact same level, as Iowa State, and Miami, right, they're all sort of in that within a basically less than a point of each other. Of course, provinces, the four seed, and those other teams are 10 and 11. So when I say it just kind of ran out of seeds, that's what I mean, they just kind of ran out of seeds. So I would expect Kansas to be about the same price. That'll be an interesting matchup is it Iowa State, obviously a team they're familiar with in the big 12? Or is it a sort of new team, so to speak, in Miami, and then finally, Purdue and UCLA, obviously, the two teams that are most likely to get out of their game, I have those teams rated equally. So again, I'm expecting a pickup game in that situation. Hopefully, we get a point or two maybe with UCLA, obviously, I'd be right, I should say, obviously, but I would be riding with UCLA against Purdue in that game. If it ends up being North Carolina. Now we got ourselves a bit of a different situation, we're going to be getting points with North Carolina. And if it's North Carolina, it probably means that they're still shooting, they're still shooting really well. And they're a team that again, theoretically, just from a program standpoint, right, all the rebounds, they should be able to compete with Purdue. But again, we'll deal with that all all in the social media this weekend, which is at M Russ authentic on Twitter.

Sheldon: 1:16:36

Well, the madness continues for yet another week. And hopefully it's more sweet and sour and sweet. 16 as we're coming up on some more than this action, my dude, thanks, as always for plugging in with us. Greatly appreciate it.

Matt: 1:16:50

Appreciate your back my friend.

Sheldon: 1:16:56

Thanks to Matt for coming on the pod and if you want to follow me online, you can do so on Instagram at Sheldon Alexander and on Twitter at Shell Alexander. Don't forget to like and subscribe to DRF sports podcast wherever you get your podcasts. Also rate us review us like us all that other fun stuff. But for more from this new project from DRF sports. Just a little reminder, if you're unfamiliar with the letters DRF stands for daily racing form, which has been around for over 100 years, giving you all of the horse racing information, data and analysis. But now we've taken over the entire sports world. So if you want coverage on every football game, as well as the NBA, MLB, college sports and more head to drf.com/sports. For all of the details and insights as a site has all of the data on every game, including offensive and defensive stats, betting angles, line movements, key injuries, Team stats, and more. The DRF data is what powers our power trends. So if you want to see which trends our analysts have selected, follow us on Instagram and on Twitter. If you want access to all the raw data drf.com/sports That's where you can find the usual previews as we deep dive into the games. Of course, gotcha covered on this podcast. However you want your betting information. We've got you covered. Again, my name is Shaun Alexander. That's all I got for now. But until next time, see.

DRF Sports: 1:18:27

Thanks for listening to the DRF sports podcast. Please subscribe rate and review the show. For more sports betting advice go to drf.com backslash sports and follow on Twitter at DRF underscore sports

Sweet 16 Picks Pod | Episode 58

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