Sports Handicapper ASA's Picks & Predictions

#858 ASA PLAY ON Middle Tennessee State -6.5 over Louisiana Tech, Friday at 7:30 PM ET - We have a huge disparity in strength of schedule in this game yet the records for these teams are nearly identical (MTSU is 7-5 and LT is 8-4). La Tech has played the 339th most difficult schedule to date and they have faced only 1 team ranked inside the top 180 and lost that game by 27 points. MTSU will be the 2nd highest rated team they’ve faced this season. Despite facing a set of defenses with an average rank of 314th in efficiency, the Bulldogs shooting numbers are bad. They rank 325th in eFG% and 358th in 3 point FG% making only 26% from deep and they only make 64% of their FTs. We don’t expect that to change here as they are facing the 2nd best defensive team they’ve seen this season (efficiency wise) and in their other game vs they only other team they’ve faced ranked inside the top 140 in defensive efficiency La Tech only scored 50 points. They are 0-4 on the road this year and have been held to 53 points or less in 3 of those 4 games. MTSU has played the 10th most difficult schedule to date already facing 6 teams ranked inside the top 100. All of their losses have come vs teams ranked inside the top 75 and they topped Murray State who ranks 96th. La Tech will be the 2nd lowest rated team they’ve played this year. The Blue Raiders are coming off a loss but a very good effort @ Houston (top 12 per KenPom) losing 69-60. Their only home loss this season was vs Belmont who is currently 13-2 and ranked 68th. Last year MTSU was a 6 point favorite at home in this game and lost providing a little extra motivation. Let’s lay it.

#884 ASA PLAY ON California -4 over Notre Dame, Friday at 11 PM ET - We like this spot for Cal coming off a 20 point home loss vs a very good Louisville team. This is also a fade spot for the Irish who won as a dog @ Stanford on Tuesday. Notre Dame was a 7 point dog in that game and now they are only +4.5 vs a Cal team that ranks nearly 20 spots higher than Stanford per KenPom. Stanford shot brutally bad in that game making only 13 of their 56 shots (23%) and just 4 of 30 from beyond the arc. While ND’s defense is solid (top 50 in efficiency), they aren’t that good. Just one of those poor shooting nights and even with those horrible shooting numbers from the Cardinal, the game was still tight with the Irish winning 47-40. Cal was roasted at home by Louisville (ranked 11th per KenPom) on Tuesday and their effort on the boards was poor (-19). Head coach Mark Madsen was disappointed with his team’s physicality in that game and mentioned, “the Notre Dame game is a huge game for us.” They don’t want to drop to 0-2 in the ACC with 2 road games on deck at UVA and Va Tech. Expect a much better effort tonight from the Bears. Prior to that setback, the Bears only loss on the year was @ Kansas State by 3 points. Cal has been at home since mid November while the Irish have been on the west coast since Monday and will be playing their 2nd of back to back roadies. Cal can score averaging 82 PPG and they make nearly 40% of their triples (17th nationally). ND only averages 65 PPG on the road this year and they are without their leading scorer Markus Burton (18 PPG) who was lost for the season a few weeks ago. They are 3-1 since Burton was injured but they did lose at home vs IPFW during that stretch and Cal will be the highest rated team they’ve faced since his injury. This one sets up nicely as a bounce back game for the Bears and we’ll lay it.

ASA NBA play on Phoenix Suns -11.5 vs. Sacramento Kings, 9 pm ET - The Kings are coming off a hard-fought game last night against the Celtics and now face a rested Suns team in their building. Sacramento is shorthanded right now with LaVine and Sabonis both out with injuries. LaVine leads the team in scoring, Sabonis leads them in rebounding. The Kings struggle to play without rest with a 5-16 ATS record dating back to the start of last season and they’ve lost those games by an average of 10+ points per game. Phoenix has been a pleasant surprise this season with a 19-14 Su record, 10-5 at home. Phoenix has solid numbers overall and rank top half of the league in efficiency differential at +1.4. In comparison, the Kings are 29th in eDIFF at -11.3. These two teams met in late November in Sacramento and the Suns won by 12-points. The Suns had won 4 straight games but are now coming off a loss to the Cavs and they’ve excelled in that situation this season with a 9-4 ATS mark. The Suns have beaten the Kings in 4 of the last five meetings in Phoenix and tonight we expect this game to get ugly late.

#267 ASA PLAY ON Navy -7 over Cincinnati, Friday at 4:30 PM ET @ Memphis, TN - One thing we know about service academies in bowl games and that is they are all in. They only have 1 opt out so they will basically be in tact for this game as they always are for bowls. Navy has won 8 of their last 10 bowl games and service academies are huge money makers this time of year going 19-3 ATS in bowls since 2003. Cincinnati is on the other end of the spectrum. They have a ton of opt outs including a huge number of key defensive players. The Bearcats will also be without their starting QB Sorsby who accounted for over 65% of Cincinnati’s total yardage this season. His back up Lichtenberg has 333 career passing yards and it looks like he will split time with freshman Jones who has taken only 2 snaps this season. That tells us that this Cincinnati staff is looking toward next year to see what they have and maybe not completely focused on winning this game. It’s really tough to defend the Navy offense if you’re not used to playing against it. They will have to play their most focused game of the season on that side of the ball and that might be tough with a bunch of back ups. Navy leads the country in rushing yards at 290 YPG on nearly 6.0 YPC. The Bearcat D allowed 174 YPG on the ground which ranked 97th. Not a great match up. On top of that, Navy actually threw the ball well this season with veteran QB Horvath averaging over 130 YPG through the air. Don’t be surprised if Navy hits some big plays through the air vs a Cincy team missing their entire starting secondary in this game. The Bearcats D was shredded down the stretch for 36.5 PPG over their last 4 and Navy will have big time success here. The Midshipmen are viewing this as their “second” Super Bowl only behind their game with Army. We already saw Army crush a disinterested UConn team 41-16 in their bowl game. Similar spot here and while we don’t expect the score to be that lopsided, we would be completely surprised if it was. Navy by 10+ in this one.

#266 ASA PLAY ON Texas State -16 over Rice, Friday at 1 PM ET @ Fort Worth, TX - We’re pretty sure Rice won’t be able to keep up on the scoreboard here. They are facing a potent Texas State offense that averages 36 PPG on 476 YPG (8th in the country). The Bobcats have put up at least 40 points 5 times this season and they’ve been held under 30 just twice vs James Madison (top 10 defense) and Arizona State. They are very balanced averaging 220 YPG rushing and 256 YPG passing. They are facing a Rice defense that ranks 127th in total defense and allowed 50+ points in each of their last 2 regular season games. The Owls defense doesn’t have a strength as they rank 95th vs the run and 127th vs the pass. They are the only team in the country to allow points on EVERY redzone appearance by their opponents this year. That’s 37 redzone trips by their opponents and 37 scores (28 TD’s). On the other side, the Rice offense is far from explosive averaging just 19 PPG this season. They can’t pass at all (97 YPG passing) so if they get way behind, which we anticipate here, it’s tough for them to come back. They’ll also be down to their 3rd string QB here, who took a grand total of 37 snaps this season, as their starter and back up have both entered the transfer portal. If they only scored 19 PPG with their top QB and a full offense how are they going to keep up in this game? The Texas State defense should be able to focus almost solely on the run here which will make it tough for the Rice offense. The Owls finished 5-7 (11th place) in at average at best AAC conference. The only reason they got into this bowl is there weren’t enough willing teams to play so they were asked. Texas State should roll in this game.