Here we are again with week 5 of our college basketball preview. As always please follow my Twitter handle @PicksbyKY for daily bets and spreads. This year has been pretty wild thus far but I feel like some consistent teams are starting to poke their head out. Below are a couple of games I will be looking at for the upcoming week.
South Dakota State @ Kent State 12/2 6:00PM
Kent State continues to show that they are one of the premiere mid major teams in the country currently sitting at 5-1 ATS. They were up nine points at one point in the second half on the #1 Houston Cougars and were leading the game with 3:22 to go! Sincere Curry is leading the way with 18 points per game while also dishing out 5.4 assists. He is the absolute leader of this team, but their other pieces are helping him out. Malique Jacobs is dumping in 12.8 points per game, 3.8 steals per game, and shooting 37.5% from deep. Miryne Thomas is scoring 11.1 points per game and bringing down 5.9 rebounds which is second on the team.
South Dakota State has started to show some holes which I worried about with all the freshman coming in and going up against a team that has looked absolutely fantastic so far this year.
I would take Kent State -9 or better in this game.
North Florida @ High Point 12/3 1:00PM
In my opinion this North Florida team is getting a little less credit than they deserve after an absolutely brutal schedule thus far. They’ve played away games against Gonzaga, Washington, Duquesne (6-1), and Kentucky. They’re a team that knows one another, returning seven of their eight top scorers and 85.9% returning possession minutes.
As things stand today, High Point has started the year off great at 6-1. I actually like High Point a lot and have bet on them several times already this year. The only issue I have with them is they’ve had somewhat of a cupcake schedule, besides a nice win against Wofford early in the season. I think they’re going to be getting too many points in this game.
I would take North Florida at +3 or better and I think the line will actually land at North Florida +5.
Oral Roberts @ Tulsa 12/3 2:00PM
I’ve been waiting to bet on Oral Roberts all year but the opportunity hasn’t seemed to come up until now. They’ve played several big schools in Utah State, Houston, and Saint Mary’s, but any time they’ve played a smaller school it’s been mostly outside of division one.
Oral Roberts is a veteran team and their top eight-minute earners this year are six seniors and two juniors. They returned their top scorer from last year in Max Abmas who had 22.8 points per game in 2021 and is now averaging 16 points per game. He’s currently shooting 29% from beyond the arc this year but is a career 38.6% shooter so I see some positive regression moving forward which should help the Golden Eagles out immensely.
My best guess on the line will be Oral Roberts -3 and I like them at -4 or better.
South Dakota State @ Montana 12/6 8:00PM
Montana just isn’t the team we are used to seeing out of the Big Sky. They have no one to run their offense from the point guard position and it shows. Their leading assist man is 6’10 222lb forward Josh Bannan, who has 3.9 assists per game, which is almost two and a half times his last year average of 1.6 assists per game.
On the flip side you have coach Eric Henderson who seems to get the most out of the Jackrabbits year in and year out. I was down on them this year and even earlier in this article. The thing is they always seem to beat teams they’re better than and this is one of those situations. They never play down to competition and I attribute that to great coaching.
They have four players averaging nine points per game or better and they’re shooting 34% from long range. I just think they’re the more talented team in this scenario by quite a bit and I don’t think the spread will reflect this.
I like South Dakota State all the way to -4 but in reality, I think they’ll be favored by 1. If Montana is somehow favored, click the money line button immediately and thank me later.
Goodluck to all of your sports gambling this weekend and as always please follow @PicksbyKY on Twitter for daily bets.
