College basketball odds: Top 3 overrated March Madness teams

The key to having any successful NCAA Tournament bracket is, most people would agree, to be able to peg a few upsets. A No. 5 seed seemingly always falls to a No. 12 every year, and so on.

However, equally as important is being able to recognize the pretender teams, the ones that will have good seeds but are clearly flawed.

Here is a look at three teams with NCAA bids pretty much locked up but that are primed for a fall early in the tournament.

WISCONSIN: Frankly, the Big Ten is way down this year. The league may only get four bids this season (Ohio State, Michigan State and Indiana are in; Michigan, Illinois and Purdue have shots at bids). Wisconsin was No. 1 in the nation for a week, but the Badgers lost back-to-back games to Michiga

again in the regular season finale, needing a late 3-pointer by Kammron Taylor to avoid the home upset. Wisconsin also hasn’t beaten a ranked team since Jan. 9 and all of its quality wins (other than at Marquette) came at home.

Expect the Badgers, who still have a shot at a No. 1 seed, to have a short stay in the NCAA Tournament.

MICHIGAN STATE: The Spartans are another team that will reach the tournament mostly because of the weakness of the Big Ten. Tom Izzo’s Spartans were supposed to be in a rebuilding mode, and his clubs always play well in the NCAAs. However, this team struggles big-time to score.

Michigan State’s only true scoring threat is junior Drew Neitzel, and if he struggles, watch out. Freshman Raymar Morgan is the only other Spartan averaging in double figures.

VIRGINIA: So, how can the co-regular season ACC champion Cavaliers be overrated. Well, look deeper. Because of the ACC’s unbalanced schedule, Virginia played eight of its league games against the bottom five teams.

And Virginia lost to the two worst teams in the ACC, Miami and Wake Forest, in the past few weeks. The loss to Wake Forest was troubling as the Cavs had a shot to win the league title outright. It would have been their first ACC title since 1995, so it’s not like they were lacking motivation.

But this is another case of a team being too dependent on one player, so look for the Cavs, who likely will be seeded somewhere between 4 and 6, to not reach the Sweet 16.

So there you have three teams that appear overrated heading into the NCAA Tournament. Sometimes the key to a successful wager is not what team you bet on, but what team you bet against.

So is this the turning point, or a sign of things to come? Get all your NCAA basketball lines in the Bodog Sportsbook, and see if the Gators are ready to repeat – currently, Florida is listed at 7/2 to win the 2006/2007 NCAA Men’s Championship!

BET on NCAA Basketball! New to Bodog? Bodog gives you free game previews and matchups, let you compare game lines, and place bets ranging from a single game bet to a multi-sport parlay.

NCAA Basketball Prediction: Look for Florida Gators to be strong again and dominate NCAA Basketball this season.

Tags: College Basketball Odds, March Madness, March Madness Bracket

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 8th, 2007 at 4:59 pm and is filed under Basketball, March Madness, NCAA Basketball, NCAA Final Four, Sports, Sports Betting, Sportsbooks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.