As the 2015 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament gets underway, better known as the “Big Dance” or March Madness, it’s time to preview some of the games. Thus we will start today with the No.6 Musketeers of Xavier 21-13 who will playing the No. 11 Rebels of Ole Miss 21-12 in the (Round of 64) games on Thursday the 19th of March 2015.
Presently the odds are favoring Xavier at -3 with the Ov/Un 145 and -160 Money Line with the comeback +140 on Ole Miss. The Round of 64 and the 2nd round game is played at the Memorial Arena in Jacksonville, Florida and the tip-off is planned for 4:15 PM ET and can be seen on TBS TV.
In the tournaments 1st round the Rebels of Ole Miss gave the fans the first big rally and comeback in those game as they had a shocking win by some 4 points over the Bears of Baylor in the incredible 1st four showdown that took place this past Tuesday the 17th of Mar. 2015. Hence Ole Miss will be looking to continue their forward momentum of their great rally to comeback win with BYU as they play the Musketeers of Xavier in one of the 1st round match-ups this Thursday night at Jacksonville, Florida.
If you’re a Xavier fan and will be betting on the Musketeers, you must know that the Musketeers amazed many media experts on that Selection Sunday game as they were able to grab a 6th seed in the 2015 tournament for the Midwest Region. To many this was not a big surprise as in their conference, the Big East, they exceeded the majority of one’s expectations in that very tough conference.
Excepted that they started their season with some losses to Auburn, Long Beach and UTEP then finished their season in the Big East with a 9-9 record. However, they succeeded in moving up in the charts with their very successful play in the tournament for the Big East. They made it to the finals in the Big East as they overtook Butler in the quarterfinals the squeaked by the Hoyas of Georgetown in an exciting semifinal game.
They were not able to beat Villanova the No. 1 team in the Big East finals, but they were on a lot of positive notes as they prepare to face the Rebels of Ole Miss. One big positive note is that they presently have one of the very best passing teams in the nation. Also, with 16.4 assists per game they rank 9th in the nation in that category.
With their skill of excellent movement with the ball, the Musketeers have become one of the highest scoring teams at 73.5 points per game, in the NCAA Division I this 2014-15 season. Presently the Xavier team has 3 players who scored in double figure this season in Davis, Bluiett and Stainbrook. The Stainbrook is their main man and they will need his best play if the care to go deep into this tournament. In the last 10 games Xavier are 6-4 SU (Straight Up) and 5-4-1 ATS (Against the Spread).
If your choice is the Rebels of Ole Miss, well they happen to be one of those teams that never quits. That was reflected in the 94-90 win over the Cougars of BYU as they kept their NCAA title hopes in progress this past Tuesday. They were down by 17 points as the game went to half-time, and managed to overcome that deficit to win the game and force this 1st round game with the Musketeers of Xavier. Their star in the game was Moody who had 26 points and 5 assists in the game as he made 10 of his 18 shots from the court and led a 15-2 run in the 2nd half of the game. Moody will again be their key to go deep in this tournament. Apart from the fact that their game with BYU was high scoring, in the end it was the defense that made the difference. The forced the Cougars to commit some 15 turnovers in the game, which permitted Ole Miss to have the edge on points created by turnovers. Yes they scored 25 points off turnovers in this game which is the most this season for the Rebels. A very positive note for the Rebels is that coming into this game with Xavier their offense has become very balanced, with 6 of the teammates with double figures in the game against BYU. Those 6 include all of their 5 starting team members and as a team this season they average 72.5 points in each game. The Rebels are excited about displaying their offensive talent against the Musketeers defenses which has given up 67.5 points in each of their games this season and ranks 202nd in Division I. In the last 10 games the Ole Miss Rebels are 5 and 5 SU and 4 and 6 ATS.
Now for those that Bet on College at an Offshore sportsbook, let me advise you that the winner of this game will advance to Round of 32 that begins on the 21st of March and will play the winner of the Baylor and the Georgia Stat Panthers.