March 13 CBB Lines

The January 14 CBB lines are live on BetRivers.com, and with a handful of conference games already out of the way, the college basketball landscape is starting to even itself out.

Rob Dauster, a longtime national college basketball writer, and co-founder of the Field of 68 Podcast Network breaks down the January 14 CBB lines has a lot to say about three Thursday night games, all of which should be extremely competitive. In the Big Ten, Purdue and Indiana go at it in one of the fiercest rivalry games in the country, But Thursday is all about West Coast basketball, thanks to San Diego State vs Utah State and BYU vs. Saint Mary’s.

COLLEGE BASKETBALL ODDS: JANUARY 14 CBB ODDS

PURDUE (8-5, 3-3) at INDIANA (8-5, 3-3), 7:00 p.m. 
MONEYLINE: Indiana -180, Purdue +148
SPREAD: Indiana -4
OVER/UNDER: 129 points
Click here for the full list of Indiana-Purdue odds.

Indiana fans, look away.

Whatever you do, do not read the next sentence I am about to write, trust me.

Since Archie Miller took over as the head coach at Indiana, the Hoosiers are 0-5 against in-state and archrival Purdue. Now, truth be told, the start of this run came at the end of the most successful era of Purdue basketball this side of Gene Keady while Indiana was in the middle of moving on from Tom Crean. Purdue has been the better basketball team with the better players for the majority of the Miller era.

That was not necessarily true last season, but that didn’t stop Matt Painter from coaching circles around Miller in the two games they played. And that is probably not the case this season, not when Indiana has an All-American in their frontcourt in Trayce Jackson-Davis.

The problem, however, is that Indiana’s strength plays precisely into the way that Purdue wants to defend them. The Boilermakers defense is built around packing in the paint, forcing teams to shoot jumpers over the top and trying to limit the amount of time that Trevion Williams has to defend on the perimeter. That is problematic against teams with good shooters, talented perimeter players and guys that thrive in ball-screens. Indiana doesn’t have much shooting, will have a limited-at-best Armaan Franklin if he’s even able to play and not sitting out again.

Now, the key here is that this is going to be a low-scoring game. I expect it to be close as well; Purdue doesn’t have the offensive firepower to just run away from people. So I’ll take the points (+4) for now because I think there is real value there, but the Purdue moneyline (+148) is something that is worth taking a look at.

SAN DIEGO STATE (9-2, 3-1) at UTAH STATE (9-3, 6-0), 9:00 p.m.
MONEYLINE: Utah State -114, San Diego State -104
SPREAD: Utah State -1
OVER/UNDER: 131 points
Click here for the full list of Utah State-San Diego State odds.

San Diego State is the better basketball team here, and given the lack of homecourt advantage created by fans, it doesn’t seem to me that they should be getting points on the road against a team that lost Sam Merrill to graduation.

The key here is that the Aztecs, who did lose Malachi Flynn, still have one of the best players in the league in Matt Mitchell as well as a big body in Nathan Mensah that should be able to deal with Utah State’s star center, Neemias Queta.

There’s too much value on the Aztecs here, and I will be on the moneyline.

BYU (9-3, 6-1) at SAINT MARY’S (9-3, 0-1), 11:00 p.m.
MONEYLINE: Saint Mary’s -113, BYU -106
SPREAD: Saint Mary’s -1
OVER/UNDER: 132.5 points
Click here for the full list of BYU-Saint Mary’s odds.

This one is a little bit more uncomfortable to bet on the road team, but here is my logic: Ever since Randy Bennett really got that thing going in Moraga, he’s built his team around a wildly ball-screen heavy offense. Last year, it was built around Jordan Ford’s shot-making coming off of those ball-screens. This year, it’s built around Tommy Kuhse’s playmaking and ability to hit the roll man. Saint Mary’s also loves a good post touch.

Mark Pope’s BYU squad is very good at limiting the roll-man in ball-screen actions and, with Purdue transfer Matt Haarms anchoring the paint, they can take away post touches pretty effectively.

This matchup screams Cougars to me.