SPORT NEWS :
The Texas A&M-Corpus Christi men’s basketball team celebrates its second Southland Conference regular season title after beating Northwestern State 83-75 on Saturday, Feb. 25, 2023 at the American Bank Center.
Islanders men’s championship team
The top two seeds in the Southland Tournament will meet in the final when No. 2 Northwestern State takes on No. 1 Texas A&M-Corpus Christi.
The winner of today’s championship game will not only be crowned Southland Tournament champions, but will also represent the conference in the NCAA Tournament later this month.
Let’s dive into the odds for the game and then I’ll give you my best bet.
Northwestern State vs. Texas A&M-CC odds, spread, and total
Northwestern State vs. Texas A&M-CC prediction and pick
These two teams are extremely similar in a lot of areas. For example, they’re 146th and 172nd in effective field goal percentage, and 155th and 195th in defensive efficiency.
That’s the case for the majority of analytics you can look at for this matchup, but there’s one key area that I think will give Texas A&M-CC the advantage, especially in a game that’s expected to be this close.
That one key area is free throws.
Northwestern State ranks 302nd in the country in personal fouls per game, committing an average of 18.8 per game. That means plenty of free throws are in store for the Islanders, which is great news for them and terrible news for the Demons.
Texas A&M-CC ranks second in the entire country in free throw percentage, knocking down 80.4% of their shots from the line.
That’s going to be the difference maker in a close game like this, so I’ll back them to win and cover the small spread.
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Odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.
