Free College Basketball Picks: Auburn at Florida State
December 17, 2009
You can get winning college basketball picks all season long from our roster of top-rated handicappers, but for now let’s look at a free pick for tonight’s game between the Auburn Tigers and the Florida State Seminoles. If you’re looking for a place to get started betting college basketball, no place gets you off to a better start than BetUS where you can qualify for a $500 match bonus with a new account and deposit of $500 or more!
Statistically speaking, Florida State’s defense has been one of the most difficult in the country to score on. The Seminoles have permitted opponents to shoot just 34.3% from the field, which ties them for second in the nation (behind Texas). They have also allowed only 53.8 points a game on their home floor. One thing that Leonard Hamilton preaches is the value of playing pressure defense, and even though the team lost the ACC defensive player of the year, Toney Douglas, in the first round of the NFL draft to the New York Knicks, they have obviously been able to maintain a very high standard. The latest college basketball spreads show Florida State favored by 9 points.
Here are some of the college basketball betting trends as they relate to this matchup:
* AUB has won 16 of its last 23 games SU
* AUB has lost 14 of its last 20 road games SU
* FSU has covered two of its last seven games
* FSU has won five of its last six games SU
* FSU has won its last five home games SU
Unfortunately, it appears Hamilton isn’t preaching ball-handling enough, and that is where the Seminoles have been hurt, an certainly miss the presence of Douglas. They are averaging 18.1 turnovers per contest, and there are only a handful of teams on the “big board” who have coughed it up more. No one else in the ACC is that close to them in that department.
Auburn won 24 games last year and got to the NIT quarterfinals before losing to Baylor. They shoot a lot more three-pointers than FSU does, and consequently they are hitting less than 44% overall as a team. They’ll play a three-guard offense, and the mission here will probably be to pull the FSU defense out to the perimeter.
Auburn lacks any effective inside presence other than Lucas Hargrove, however, and Florida State will most likely own the paint with Solomon Alabi and Chris Singleton, who average more than four blocks a game between them and are also the team’s two leading scorers. That doesn’t mean there is a lot of offensive firepower, though.
Florida State has been incredibly inconsistent from the free throw line, and has nobody who has really stepped up to be a floor leader. They also aren’t built to pull away from most quality teams. If Auburn can hit some threes (and they have 18 in their last two outings) they may never be out of this game. In a small recommendation, we’re taking Auburn, the nine-point underdog. PLAY AUBURN +9
