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The Elite Eight is all set for Saturday, with Houston taking on Villanova, and Duke facing Arkansas. "Where's Gonzaga?" some might say. They are going to be any home watching with the rest of us whose bracket they blew wide open by taking a massive loss to a smaller and less skilled Razorbacks team. Can we talk about Gonzaga in this article? I would love to rant about them for the next 5 minutes of typing, but alas, we move forward and will talk about who has the best chance of getting an outright win this weekend as an underdog.
There are only two games to choose from, and both are lined as very close contests, so it is hard to really say a team is an underdog. However, we will work with what we have, and I'll go over which plus money dog I like better to advance onto the Final Four.
Back Jay Wright And Experienced Villanova
That's right, there is no way I am going against Coach K here, the storyline for him seems destined to succeed. Whether or not that is by random chance, or maybe someone somewhere wants him to go out on top remains to be seen, but I refuse to bet against a story driven narrative like that. Instead, why not back a #2 seed as an underdog against a very under-seeded #5? I like Houston, a lot actually. They are probably the best team left in this tournament overall, and the oddsmakers are giving them that respect by making them -2 favorites here over a higher seed.
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Houston has come up with ten or more offensive rebounds in each of the last five games, and they're now 25-1 when coming up with ten or more. Villanova has allowed 11 or more offensive boards in four of its last five games. That usually would spell trouble for the Wildcats, right? In most cases yes, but Villanova can overcome this weakness by playing to their strengths as well in this game.
The Arizona version of the Wildcats couldn't get it done Thursday night, as the #1 seed fell to this great Cougars defense. They looked sloppy yet again, as they did against Wright St. and TCU in their previous matches. You could tell that the frustration was starting to get to them as they were smothered up by Houston, and in the end, they couldn't recover.
Villanova's Wildcats won’t be intimidated by Houston, and they won’t be sloppy. They are one of the best teams in the country at ball security, 12th in the nation in fewest turnovers, as they rarely turn it over a bunch of times in a game. This is a veteran team that is full of upperclassmen who make their shots in key spots, and leads all of college basketball on the free throw line. All of this combines into exactly what you want in a championship college basketball team.
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The Wildcats turned it over six times in the win over Michigan and nine times in the win over Ohio State. It hasn’t turned it over more than ten times in a game since March 10. They always find a way to make shots when they need to, and Villanova relies heavily on their starters to get the job done. This is typical of recent Jay Wright teams, playing a shorter rotation and being very efficient on offense with a lot of interchangeable players. All three of Villanova's main guards; Collin Gillespie, Caleb Daniels, and Justin Moore, shoot over 34 percent from three-point range.
Give me Villanova to get the outright win.
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