James Alberino
Marquette +4.5 vs St. Bonaventure – 2 units (bets are rated 1 to 5 units)
Charleston Classic Championship.
Marquette is very good and can win this game. Marquette as 5 point dogs just beat West Virginia by 11 in the semifinals Friday night and held WV to 24 points in the 2nd half. They beat Illinois as 8 point dogs last week. They’re being rated by the books mostly based off of last year’s 8-10 season in the Big East and they’re much better than that and Shaka Smart recruited a lot of size, athleticism and shooters. The Bonnies are good and were great bets last year but they’re ranked now and their time of being a hidden gem is over so just off that alone we are not getting value on the # for the Bonnies. They have a strong starting 5 but the bench is where they can struggle – their bench didn’t score vs Clemson (and was a reason why the Bonnies had only 45 points at the 10 minute mark of the 2nd half). The bench is scoring only 8.9 ppg through 4 games and vs Clemson 2 of their top players (Kyle Lofton and Jaren Holmes) combined for 9 for 13 from three and they only won by 3 points. Marquette switches defenses and are not easy to play against – they zone press, play good man, and play good halfcourt zone to switch things up. This should be a great championship game that’s close most of the way and Marquette can play with a lead at points. They have a little bit of everything – starpower with Justin Lewis and Darryl Morsell, shooters with Kobek and Kam Jones, and they are not easy to score against inside with Kuath and Ighodaro. The Bonnies scored 67, 69, and 68 their last 3 games and without scoring depth beyond their starting 5 this should be another game where the points with the underdog are valuable as Marquette looks to go 4-0 ATS as dogs to start the season.
