This is an excerpt from a longer and more boring piece I posted at outoflasvegas.com
I would love to hear feedback from other guys who cap college hoops because I know we all have a different take and experience on what's happened and what's going to happen next.
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Scotty's CBB 30 Day Conference Recap
There's over twenty some-odd conferences and over 350 teams so it's foolish to make any kind of blanket statements about the state of college hoops this year, so I'll post what's happening or not-happening for me and maybe some of you can relate.
College hoops is pretty much the only sport I handicap. I dabble with the NFL and MLB, but this is the sport that I seem to click with. And oddly enough, I'm not a big college hoops fan. Go figure! But I think that also helps me to be objective. For me it's all about momentum, chemistry, and the situation. And I love to play on teams on the rise whether they're the favorite or the dog, but if you look at my record you'll see I like favorites that a surging. I only pay attention these conferences, in order of preference: Mountain West, Big West, West Coast, and I keep a lookout for sleepers in the Big Sky and the Pac 12.
We're now about 5 weeks into play and more than any other year the beginning of this year has been a real roller coaster ride. No team I follow has been consistent enough, good or bad, to bet on or against. San Diego State looks like a sweet sixteen team the first 3 weeks then gets walloped 49-36 at Washington. Arizona, everyone's pick to win the Pac 12, has won every game, but they still lack the fluidity to be a top 10 team in my opinion, but even Arizona is only 6-5 ATS. UNLV is a disaster waiting to happen. And there's more.
In my little world we're in a period of time when the soon-to-be annointed also-rans, the wannabes, and the rebuilders catch up to their more established and higher ranked opponents, at least when ATS results are taken into consideration. It's like a 2 or 3 week window when logic goes right out the window. These teams don't actually beat their big brothers, but they do make strong, concerted challenges and in some cases David whoops Goliath's ass as N. Arizona did the other night against St. Mary's. As handicappers. we're always trying to catch lightning in the proverbial bottle, but since there's such parity within each subset of the 350 teams, it's hard to find those unique statistical and situational nuggets that point to teams on the rise. And is the usual case, the books are two steps ahead of us making it that more difficult and they love to fuel our doubts.
Unfortunately, we've yet to get to conference play and we're at the doorstep of the Xmas Holiday tournaments so we'll have to wade through two more weeks of guessing, travel issues, time changes, and kids that are homesick for family time on Xmas day. It is my opinion that this has been a very uneventful first 30 days of college hoops. Not only have there been no surprises, or standout performances, it appears there's a real lack of media hype and more importantly, interest. Maybe we all know that a few loses in these early weeks don't carry any real weight… as long as you lose to the "right" team. We know this is a trial and error period for even the best teams, so if we want to make money we try to outthink the marketplace. Good luck with that angle!
I would have liked to play on more games these first 30 days, made more picks, but whether it's me or a lackluster schedule I just haven't found much to motivate me. I am looking forward to the holiday tournaments as I think it will reveal some of the frauds. I'm not a big fan of the millions of college football bowls, so any holiday hoops is a welcome diversion. As for the Mountain West, Big West, West Coast, Big Sky, and Pac 12 conferences, I've only been able to single out a few over-priced front runners to fade in conference play. And believe me on this, you'll hear about them.
I'll post an update to this as we near New Years and the first conference games.
And by the way, I'm only a small voice in this fabulous collection of college basketball handicappers at pregame. My opinions may be totally wrong for you, but I know there's somebody here who caps in your neck of the woods.
Good luck to all, happy holidays, and let's make some money.