The second-seeded Fighting Irish of Notre Dame and 10th seed Florida State Seminoles, will vie for a spot in the final "Sweet Sixteen" of the 2011 Men's NCAA Basketball Tournament when they play the final game of sub-regional action at the United Center in Chicago with tip-off time at approximately 9:40 pm Eastern. The winner will advance to play the winner of Sunday's Virginia Commonwealth/Purdue game at the Southwest Regional Finals next weekend.
Odds makers at most off shore sports shops list the Irish as 4 1/2-chalk NCAA Point Spreads favorites for the game with a combined point total of 131. 'Noles backers are getting +170 odds on the off shore money line while the price of a ML wager on Notre Dame is -200. For bettors unfamiliar with the moneyline format;in order to win $100 betting on the Irish, it requires a $200 wager. On the flip side, today's underdog, lined at +170 ML odds wins $170 with a SU win.
Early betting trends, always good tools for making NCAA Basketball Picks , tell players how the rest of the world is betting compared to them. For this game between Notre Dame and FSU, the public is solid behind the Irish with side betting action at 80 percent while 64 percent of money line action on Notre Dame to win the game SU. Betting the total is tighter with 58 percent of wagers choosing the game score to go UNDER the total 133 posted by odds makers.
Florida State of the BIG EAST Conference currently owns a 22-10 record with a 15-10-2 mark ATS. Notre Dame is currently 27-6 SU on the season and is 16-12-0 ATS. Both FSU and Notre Dame have a 1-game winning streak.
One would think that home and road trends would not pertain in a game played on a neutral court but that's not the case here. Chicago-land is Notre Dame-land with South Bend a near neighbor to the East. The Irish were very good at home going 21-1 and the United Center will be a virtual home game for the Irish. Well,unless the Purdue fans stick around for the night-cap following their game with VCU. Against the spread, the Irish covered in 11-of-17 home games and were 5-6 away.
FSU went 22-10 for the year, 12-4 at home and 10-6 on the road. The Seminoles covered ATS in 6-of-10 at home and were impressive ATS on the road covering 9-of-15.
Notre Dame played through some tough BIG EAST wars this season, a league considered the best in the land. At the end, the Irish were one of the hotter teams winning eight of its last 10 games SU.
FSU is hot at the betting window for backers covering four straight while the UNDER has cashed on the total in 4-of-5 games.Since Jan. 16 Notre Dame has gone 16-3 SU.
Making NCAA Basketball Predictions on this game is challenging but I'm going with the Irish to win this game in front of a partisan Irish crowd and to cover the 4 1/2-chalk.
