November: 46-38, +5.20
November Leans: 39-38
December: 65-70, -9.45
December Leans: 67-79
January: 42-33, +11.90
January Leans: 37-33
I’m going to take a shot on Ball State tonight. Cross-divisional match-ups start up in the MAC, and not too many of them will be important come the end of the season and seeding for the MAC tournament, but this is one of the few that will. For starters, both lead their current version, and I’d be stunned if Ball State doesn’t win the West half of the MAC by a few games. They’re simply better than everyone in that half. They’re more physical, they can defend, and they can shoot it a ton better than what that half of the MAC can do. The basis for the play here, is that it’s just not a good spot at all for Akron. For one, they’re coming off a huge rivalry game that they won. Second, they’re coming off an incredibly tough four game stretch on their own half of the MAC where they looked far from decent in those games. Sure, they won 3 of them. However, they struggled against a similar Bowling Green squad, they won the Ohio game based solely on officiating (I rarely go into the officiating, but if you watched that game, it was borderline horrific – and I had Akron there), they looked terrible at Buffalo, and as I previously mentioned, they just beat their rival in a game was predicted as the other half of the MAC’s title game. They now hit the road here with Ball State. If you look at Ball State’s season, they’ve played some very easy competition as they have one of the worst strength of schedule’s in the country. I’m not a big strength of schedule guy until the postseason, but this can be looked at a few ways. One, they haven’t played a strong enough schedule to be tested in a game like this. I can agree with that. But the other side of the coin, is that they hold value because they haven’t been tested. I think it’s safe to say Akron’s been tested, but have they been tested too much? Like I said, they’re coming off a brutal four game stretch, four differing styles, and come into a fifth here. I don’t think the strength of schedule is all that important in this matchup, but it’s one of the reasons that Ball State isn’t laying more here. Back to how Ball State’s schedule has panned out, they’ve struggled against snails and zones in all of their losses. The Morehead press and zone baffled them (it’s baffling everyone), as did the Cuse style zone that Eastern Michigan is currently running through the MAC with (they’re 4-1, but once teams see it a second time, they’re going to get exposed). Akron’s not going to play zone, and they have shown no reason to slow the tempo. Ball State will welcome that, and the offense should look better as a result. These two teams match-up extremely well in the paint, and I give the guard advantage to Ball State, which is where I want the advantage if this game gets up and down. That, along with Ball State’s outside shooting should be the determining factor in the game. Not only that, but the best interior defender in the MAC is probably Zeke Marshall from Akron. Obviously, Ball State’s best player is Jones in the paint. Here’s what’s going to be different. Dambrot never, ever, ever double teams anyone. He never has, and he’s probably not going to do that here. He depends on a man-to-man defense with help from everywhere, but no double teams at all. As I mentioned, Marshall’s a really good defender, but he can’t guard Jones. He can’t step out of the paint and guard on the perimeter, and he won’t be able to keep up with him outside of the block in the perimeter iso sets that Ball State runs from him. If they don’t double-team Jones, he’s going to have a really good game, and they’d be the first team in the MAC that hasn’t done it all year. Bring Marshall out of the paint, and it opens up other lanes of scoring, and if by chance they do double, then I get more open looks from the perimeter than normal. From a strictly motivational standpoint, the spot is prime for Ball State. They just went on the road, completed a successful roadtrip, and return home to face the defending MAC champ, while that defending MAC champ just won it’s game of the year against its rival. This is a big, big, big game for Ball State, and I don’t think they disappoint.
5* Ball State -1
One more, maybe two...
GL