College Hoops

First off let me state the following. These are general guidelines. Handicapping successfully requires a constant state of evolvement and compensation, so keep that in mind.

I find handicapping NCAA Basketball a bit intimidating simply due to the sheer number of games per week. So the first thing you need to do is to narrow your scope of games you are going to breakdown. 

Some handicappers concentrate on a single conference, which to me is a bit TOO constraining.

Others break it down to Top 25 Teams only, or two ranked teams playing each other only.

What I have found to make me money is to track games on TV and break them down on a daily basis. (Monday, Tuesday, etc…)

This method accomplishes several things.

It cuts down the games you have to handicap each week to manageable number. 

It puts you in action every day of the week. 

It has you dealing with quality teams in the larger conference because they are the teams that get on TV. 

I don’t want to give away too many secrets but just for an example on Thursday Night Football this year the UNDER has come in the last five games straight. So you would probably have picked up the trend after three straight wins, so for the past two weeks you had an easy winner waiting for you every Thursday with needing to do any extra work.

Another handicapping angle involves employing the top teams. After week two of the season note who the top ten days in the National Rankings are. The as the season progresses chart what teams do against the spread the game FOLLOWING their contest against the top tier team. Using this system uncovered a trend that went 17-3 last season.

Another good system is watching for a ranked team to lose outright as  a favorite. Now most of you are thinking go with that team the next game and you are wrong. College is not the like the pros where the players look at the game as their job and tend not have to have too many emotional peaks and valleys.

College games are played by kids, who tend to carry the previous game with them. A good example was the Wisconsin Badgers. Highly ranked and quite successful last year, Wisconsin still managed to lose five games outright last year as favorites. In every single game following those losses, the Badgers won the next game but failed to cover.

A simple and sneaky trend to use on your bookmakers is to track what 12 PM ET games do each Saturday as far as favorites and over and unders. Last season in games starting before 1 PM ET, the UNDER came in a whopping 66% of the time. Why you may ask, who cares is my answer.

To be a good handicapper you need to accept trends for what they are, trends. The reason why they work simply does not matter, only the fact that the trends DO work is the only thing that matters.

I could go on all day with these tricks of the trade but if I let too many cats out of the bag, why do you need me?

Have a good week and I hope what you read here today produces a nifty little windfall.