Saturday provides a mix of heavyweight, ranked matchups and exciting mid-major tournament play.
Let’s dip into both, starting down in H-Town.
No. 14 Kansas at No. 1 Houston
According to Bart Torvik’s “TourneyCast,” Houston is a virtual lock at 99.6 percent to secure a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament.
But the Cougars still have reasons to give it their all against Kansas.
For starters, a win would secure them an outright Big 12 regular-season title.
It’s worth noting that Iowa State could drop its game against K-State before tip-off, locking things up for UH. Iowa State has been installed as a six-point road favorite in Manhattan.
The second, and more meaningful, angle favoring the Coogs is the revenge factor against Kansas.
The Jayhawks eviscerated UH’s defense in their first meeting, scoring 78 points on 68.9 percent shooting from the field.
But on the personnel front, Houston is banged up.
Season-ending injuries to Ramon Walker Jr. and Joseph Tugler in the past three weeks have thinned out its bench and both Ja’Vier Francis and J’Wan Roberts are nursing injuries.
Kansas, meanwhile, is getting healthier having welcomed Kevin McCullar Jr. back to the lineup.
After knocking the rust off in his first game back, McCullar Jr. looked like his old self against K-State.
He was also noticeably disruptive on the defensive end collecting four “stocks” in just 29 minutes of action.
Houston simply isn’t reliable as a favorite. Sampson’s team is 2-8 against the spread in its last 10 and a big reason for that is its offense can sputter at times.
Those lulls nearly cost them recent games against Baylor and Oklahoma, which is why I’d rather take the points and cash in on a second-half run from the rejuvenated Jayhawks.
Recommendation: Kansas +8.
Marshall vs. James Madison (Sun Belt Conference quarterfinals)
It’s rare to find a 28-3 team flying under the radar, but that’s exactly what we have here with the Dukes.
James Madison opened the season with a shocking upset of No. 4 Michigan State in East Lansing and proceeded to steam out to a 14-0 start, a school record.
After that blistering start, JMU dropped three games in January, most notably a season sweep at the hands of App State.
The narrative was that James Madison had lost its mojo and could be bullied by solid defensive teams.
But then the calendar flipped to February and Mark Byington’s team turned it on. Ten straight wins coming by an average margin of 14.6 points per game.
During this run, JMU has been knocking down 3s at a 40.1 percent clip (22nd) and defending the 3-point line better than any team in the SBC (28.4 percent, 16th).
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During their resurgence, the Dukes whipped the Herd by 15 at home and 26 on the road. And critically, Marshall struggles when facing other uptempo teams.
Evan Miya’s “Pace Adjust” metric notes that Marshall underperforms more than any team in the SBC when forced to play in a high-possession game.
James Madison leads the conference with 74.2 possessions per night. Marshall also played on Thursday, while the Dukes enjoyed a week off between games.
Marshall is 1-3 ATS this season when facing a rest disadvantage, failing to cover those games by an average of seven points per contest.
And finally, JMU has put together 29 “Kill Shot” runs of 10-0 or better this season. That’s the third-best number in the nation. The Dukes blitz teams and run away with games.
They did it to Marshall in the second half of both of their meetings this season, and I foresee another big run burying the Herd in the SBC quarterfinals.
Recommendation: James Madison -11.