Saturday College Basketball and we will see the Miami Hurricanes travel to Carrier Dome to take on the Syracuse Orange. The game has a start time of 4:00 pm (Eastern) and will be televised on ESPN 2. Current Vegas betting odds have Syracuse listed as 2 point favorites, while the total is set at 128.
Analysis: The Miami Hurricanes come in off a hard fought 65-60 win over NC State. The win now has them at 13-5 overall, including 3-2 in the ACC and 3-1 in true road games. Miami has gone 4-1 ATS in their last 5 road games vs. a team with a home winning % of greater than .600 and 18-8 ATS in their last 26 Saturday games, but just 2-5-1 ATS in their last 8 games vs. a team with a winning S.U. record. Miami has been a decent offensive team this year, ranking 105th in scoring (70.7 ppg), 106th in shooting (44.9%), 56th in 3 point shooting (37.4%) and 70th in FT shooting (72.2%). The defense for this team has been solid, ranking 100th in points allowed (62.8 ppg), 126th in defensive FG% (41.3%) and 131st in 3 point defense (32.8%).
The Syracuse Orange have won 8 of their last 9 games, including a hard fought 69-61 home over Boston College on Tuesday night. The Cuse now stand at 14-5 overall, 5-1 in the ACC and 11-1 at home. The Orange have gone 5-11 ATS in their last 16 home games and 1-6 ATS in their last 7 vs. the ACC. Syracuse has been an average offensive team this year, ranking 149th in scoring (68.8 ppg), 164th in shooting (43.7%), 259th in 3 point shooting (31.6%) and 281st in FT shooting (65.9%). Defensively the Cuse have been very good as they come in ranked 32nd in points allowed (59.5 ppg), 16th in defensive FG% (37.6%) and 17th in 3 point defense (28.8%).
Pick: Lets go with the Under here. The Cuse are not a good offensive team and they are a poor shooting team, especially from long range and at the charity stripe, but what they do do well is play defense as they have allowed just 59.6 ppg overall and 55.6 ppg at home. Miami has struggled on defense on the road and have allowed 74.5 in their two ACC road games, but that was vs Duke and Notre Dame and Syracuse does not play like either of those teams on offense. They Slow the pace and rely on their defense to win games. We also note that the Cuse zone is designed to slow offenses down and us most of the clock. I fully expect the Cuse to keep the pace down here, which is also something that is Ok with Miami. The two meetings last year produced just 116 and 93 points and I expect this one to be played under 120 points as well.
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