The only number one seed left in the NCAA Betting Tournament takes the court on Saturday night as Duke plays second seed West Virginia in the late game of the Final Four at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. Duke is no stranger to the Final Four as this will be their 15th all-time appearance and 11th under head coach Mike Krzyzewski but their first since 2004. This will be West Virginia’s first appearance in the Final Four since 1959.
Duke is a 2.5 point favorite with a total of 131 at SBG Global.
This will be the third time that Duke and West Virginia have met in the NCAA Tournament. Duke won 70-63 in the second round of the 1989 tournament while West Virginia won 73-67 in the second round of the 2008 NCAA Tournament.
West Virginia has the best player in this game in Da’Sean Butler and he always seems to hit the key shots. In a game that is expected to be close the best player on the court oftentimes is the difference, and in this game between Duke and West Virginia that player is Butler. West Virginia plays excellent defense as they allowed just 63.1 points per game this college basketball betting season.
The Blue Devils are led by Jon Scheyer, Kyle Singler and Nolan Smith. The key player for Duke is Scheyer. He led the team with 104 3-pointers and an average of 18.2 points this season. Scheyer has seen it all at Duke, as in his freshmen year the Blue Devils lost in the first round. ”It didn’t start off the best,” Scheyer said, ”We’ve grown and gone a step farther each of our years, and winning some more games as we went along. It says a lot for our group to get to this point, but we really want to finish it off.”
Here are the betting stats for Saturday’s game. The Mountaineers are 5-0-1 ATS in their last 6 NCAA Tournament games as an underdog. The Mountaineers are 5-1 ATS in their last 6 vs. the ACC. The Blue Devils are 4-0 ATS in their last 4 NCAA Tournament games. The Blue Devils are 1-5-1 ATS in their last 7 vs. the Big East.
The Under is 7-1 in the Mountaineers last 8 overall. The Under is 4-1 in the Blue Devils last 5 NCAA Tournament games. The Under is 9-4 in the Blue Devils last 13 vs. the Big East.
