Jake's College Basketball Picks 2/11

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a year ago

Jake S

Happy Saturday, everyone! I had a very busy week with exams, but if you followed Instagram, you would see that I hit 2 teasers this week and went up 6 units. Now that most of the exams are over for a couple of weeks, I should be able to produce more articles and continue hitting bets. The featured game of the day is Rutgers vs. Illinois.

Rutgers vs. Illinois: Illinois -2.5.

Both these teams have been in the mix with the rest of the top 75% of the Big Ten this year. Rutgers has been a surprise to many, and Steve Pikiel finally got his squad to be a leader in the Big Ten Conference. Led by Cliff Omoruyi and Paul Mulcahy, Rutgers is ranked number 24 in the AP Poll and 17th in the Kenpom. One thing with Rutgers is that they play very conservatively. They give up the least amount of boom runs (runs of 10+ points) in the nation and can easily make a run on another team. With this style of basketball, many of their games are close games, and the one spark Rutgers gets pushes them over the hump and usually leads to victory. The emergence of Cam Spencer and Andre Hyatt has also given the Scarlet Knights a great complement to Cliff and Mulcahy.

However, the game is being played in Illinois, and Rutgers has been terrible away from Jersey Mikes Arena. Illinois is a solid team and has cemented itself year after year at the top of the Big Ten. With Illinois coming off a tough loss against Iowa and having they're against Minnesota get postponed, the Illini are going to be loose. Terance Shannon Jr. has been lights out this year, commanding the Illini offense. He is shooting 44% from the field and 33% from deep. In addition, Baylor transfer Matt Mayer has also established himself in the offense. One matchup I am looking forward to for tomorrow is Cliff Omoruyi vs. Dain Dainja in the paint. Whoever wins that matchup, their team will benefit greatly.

Some betting points on the match: