BetIQ Daily: Creighton and Florida NCAA Tournament Futures Picks and College Basketball Notes

Friday's BetIQ Daily looks at a couple of NCAA Tournament futures picks, as noted in our Staff Picks this week.

March 4, 2022 - by Jason Lisk

The Creighton Blue Jays likely sewed up an NCAA bid with their second win against UConn (M. Anthony Nesmith/Icon Sportswire)

We’re continuing to post picks for subscribers in our staff betting picks for conference championships.

Yesterday, some markets opened up on whether teams would make or miss the NCAA Tournament and some seed-based props. We have several picks in our most recent update, and we’ll include two of them in today’s BetIQ Daily.

1) Creighton to Make NCAA Tournament (-475)

  • This prop is available at DraftKings at release time.
  • When we posted the pick to subscribers yesterday, it was at -350, but it’s still playable as our break-even price was Creighton -740 to make tourney (and results like the Michigan loss Thursday night only help that value).
  • Creighton beat Connecticut on Wednesday to move to 12-6 in Big East play, and 20-9 overall.
  • The Blue Jays now have five Big East wins over tournament teams (sweeps of Connecticut and Marquette, win over Villanova)
  • By clinching a top-four seed in the conference tourney, Creighton does not have to risk a bad loss to get to quarterfinals.
  • The Bluejays are likely in even if they lose twice to Seton Hall; they just need to avoid key injuries and blowout losses.
  • Currently project as a No. 9 seed, at least 10 teams above the cutline entering the weekend.

2) Florida to Make NCAA Tournament (+300)

  • This prop is available at DraftKings at release time. 
  • Our playable break-even price is Florida +170 to make tourney.
  • Florida is likely on the wrong side of bubble right now based on our projections, but it has several “outs” to move into field.
  • First up, the Gators host Kentucky on Saturday, and a big win at home to close the regular season would launch them around most bubble teams.
  • Even if they don’t win that game, they will have an opportunity for a big win in SEC tournament, and they should lock up an at-large bid by reaching SEC semis with a win in SEC quarterfinals against a top-rated opponent.

NCAA Tournament Team Notes

One of the projects we are working on is an in-depth study of all potential tournament teams. These notes and observations help inform our assessment of teams as we look at the computer power ratings and make decisions on which teams might have hidden value when looking at those season-long numbers.

If you want access to those notes, become a betting subscriber and/or subscribe to our NCAA Bracket Picks.

Here is a sample for the USC Trojans:

  • USC has three starters 6’9″ or taller, giving it one of the taller lineups in the tournament.
  • Trojans don’t shoot three-pointers at a high volume, but they do have three starters who made at least 35 percent of their three-point attempts during the season, including forwards Drew Peterson and Isaiah Mobley.
  • The Trojans rank near the top of college basketball in effective field-goal percentage allowed, and their results are heavily tied to opponent offensive efficiency.
  • When opponents have an effective field-goal percentage of 50 percent or higher, USC is only 3-5, but it is 22-0 when holding opponents under that figure.
  • Opponents shot at least 40 percent from three-point range in all five USC losses.

Top Pick Performance Trends

Our college basketball spread picks listed in BetIQ Daily went 19-13 in the month of February. ATS college basketball picks rated as playable with 55.0% confidence are 14-5 since the start of February.

As of post time, here are some other highlights of prediction performance from our primary Ensemble Forecast model this season for playable-rated picks (52.5% confidence or better) against game-day betting lines:

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