Posts Tagged ‘Rhode Island Rams’

Weekly Sports Betting Rap Sheet 3/15

March 15th, 2010 by Adam Markowitz (Bankroll Sports Columnist) | Posted in General Handicapping   Comments Off on Weekly Sports Betting Rap Sheet 3/15
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The brackets have been released for March Madness, and there are already teams lined up out the door that want to take their swipes at the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee for leaving them out of the field of 65. All of these teams have one thing in common, though. They all lost when it really counted and all had holes their resume. Here’s our March Madness edition of our Weekly Rap Sheet.

Rap Sheet Picture of the Week

Connecticut Huskies HC Jim Calhoun while watching his team crash out of the Big East Tournament to St. John’s.

It feels like this is a weekly ordeal, but at last, it’s finally over with. The 2009-10 Connecticut Huskies are no more. Poor HC Jim Calhoun had to sit there and watch his team blow it out its you know what against the Johnnies on Wednesday at the Big East Tournament. UConn turned the ball over 19 times in defeat. G Kemba Walker shot just 4/17 from the field, but at least it looked like he was trying out there. G Jerome Dyson, on the other hand, looked like he quit on his team. The superstar turned the ball over nine times and was just never mentally in the game. With their season hanging in the balance, the Huskies came up flat against a bad team and lost 73-51 to fall completely out of consideration for the NCAA Tournament.

Not only are we going to take a swipe at the Rhode Island Rams, but we’re going to go after all four bubble teams in the Atlantic 10 as well. None… Not one of you put together enough of a resume to even be considered one of the last four teams left home from the dance. URI looked alright until getting smashed to bits 57-44 by Temple. Even a close loss might’ve made the Rams look like a potential NCAA Tournament team. As for the Charlotte 49ers, Dayton Fliers, and St. Louis Billikens… C’mon guys. You really didn’t think you had a chance of reaching the big dance when you didn’t even qualify for your league semifinals, did you? Charlotte, we’re especially pointing the finger at you. You screwed up by losing to 12-20 Massachusetts on your home court to end your season with losses in seven of your L/8 games.

Yeah, Mississippi State Bulldogs, I hear you moaning as well, especially after you were just a matter of a few tenths of a second from winning the SEC. You’ve got a heck of a lot better gripe about going to the dance after playing the Cats tough, and your win over Florida in the SEC Tournament paired with two wins over Ole Miss should’ve been good enough to go dancing, right? Sorry… Tournament teams don’t lose to Rider on opening night at home by two touchdowns. You should’ve known that your season was over right then and there.

The Virginia Tech Hokies has a nice little gripe, right? After all, 23 wins, ten of which came in the ACC should’ve been good enough to get into the NCAA Tournament, right? Wrong. Play somebody. Brown, UNC-Greensboro, Campbell, Delaware, Iowa, Georgia, VMI, Penn State, Charleston Southern, Maryland-Baltimore County, Longwood, Seton Hall, and North Carolina Central. Those were your out of conference wins. Give me a break. Don’t fall flat on your face against Miami in your first ACC Tournament game, and you’re dancing. For now, don’t complain.

A-10’s A-Listers in for a Wacky Wednesday

February 24th, 2010 by Adam Markowitz (Bankroll Sports Columnist) | Posted in NCAA Basketball   Comments Off on A-10’s A-Listers in for a Wacky Wednesday

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If you’re Bernadette McGlade, you’re really biting your fingernails about Wednesday night on the hardwood. Why, you may ask?

McGlade is the Commissioner of the Atlantic 10, a conference which could still get as much exposure as having seven or eight teams in March Madness, and as little as three.

This could be the day that all of this mess is sorted out…

… Or it could be another day where more madness is made!

Let’s start with the teams that we know are in awfully good shape, shall we?

The Temple Owls have put together a resume that just about any team would be proud to have. They’re 22-5, have 11 wins away from the City of Brotherly Love to their resume, and a dominant 10-2 record against the very difficult A-10. They’re in, and we know it. The only question is how high they’ll end up ranking when it’s all said and done.

Then there are the Richmond Spiders and the Xavier Musketeers, of which are a combined 31-20 against the college basketball spreads on the season. Both have great wins against big conference opponents, and they’re also a combined 21-4 in conference play. Again, they’re both dancing barring a collapse of epic proportions.

Now, the rest of the bunch…

The Rhode Island Rams are the only team in the A-10 of any bubble consequence to be off on Wednesday night. They’re probably sitting right there on the bubble at 20-6 overall, as an 8-5 record in the A-10 and a rather weak out-of-conference schedule aren’t helping their case any.

The teams that really have make-or-break nights are the Charlotte 49ers, the Dayton Fliers, and the St. Louis Billikens.

Charlotte has been going in the wrong direction now for a few weeks, which has taken it from being a sure-fire tourney team to one that is probably just barely hanging on to its position on the bubble. Tonight, the 49ers will look to end their string of three straight losses against a St. Joe’s team that is only 1-10 on the road this season and has lost four straight of its own.

A win probably won’t help Charlotte much, as it is a 9.5-point NCAA basketball betting favorite, but a loss would be devastating and most likely lethal.

Dayton and St. Louis are far different stories. Both teams have identical 18-8 records. The Billikens’ 9-3 A-10 record looks better than the 7-5 mark of the Fliers, but St. Louis doesn’t have OOC wins against Georgia Tech and Old Dominion like Dayton does. The Fliers have a better RPI (43) than do the Billikens (82), but if the Selection Committee is interested in “what have you done for me lately,” St. Louis has won six straight, while Dayton has lost two of its L/3 and is only 5-5 in its L/10.

The resumes are remarkably similar, and both teams are sitting right there in that “last four in” or “last four old” block. Even tonight, these two teams are taking a similar path. Both are 4.5-point underdogs against one of these teams that we’ve already classified as locks for the NCAA Tournament.

Dayton travels to Temple tonight at 6:30 ET, while St. Louis plays host to Xavier with tip-off scheduled for 8:00 ET.
At the end of the day today, a lot of bubble teams floating around the country will either be a heck of a lot happier or under a lot more pressure.

Even though the Commissioner of a conference isn’t supposed to take sides, it’s hard to blame Bernadette McGlade for wearing her Dayton hat, her Charlotte jersey, and her St. Louis sweatpants while she watches these games this evening.