After posting my weekly breakdown of the full NFL schedule for the opening weekend of the playoffs, Wednesday was spent, believe it or not, getting caught up on the NHL season.
Longtime readers will remember the winter/spring of 2019 when NHL 1st Period Overs were our personal ATM, including the “Follow the Money 5.” Great times! We’ve had success with these plays the last couple of years, but nothing like that run. Since mid-week college football games dried up after bowl season, I’ve been paying more attention to the NHL and NBA as we’ve been needing to continue my daily top plays that have been so hot. I’ve been mostly relying on swagger and anti-swagger plays as I’ve had a lot of success with those, but when NHL 1P Overs went 10-0 on Tuesday, that was a wakeup call that I really needed to pay attention to those again. I wish I had shared the Ducks 1P Over yesterday as they improved to a league-best 30-11 (75%) with 1P Overs on Wednesday (note: all NHL betting stats I’m posting here are from @PSUOtto on Twitter unless otherwise noted as he’s also part of the “Follow the Money” Army over the years), as I lost my NBA Best Bet on the Pacers +5 at the Knicks. That lost 119-113, but I’m not going to call it a Bad Beat as the Pacers trailed 37-21 at the end of the first quarter and by 21 at 62-41 at halftime and I thought I was drawing dead, but – as I’ve written dozens of times: “in the NBA, everyone makes a run.” So, the Pacers actually pulled with 95-92 with 9:13 remaining in the fourth quarter, 105-103 with 3:10 left, 112-109 at the 1:22 mark and even 117-113 with 11.1 seconds left before giving up a dunk to lose the cover. That dropped our record to 43-30-2 ATS (58.9%) with our daily top play the past 75 days since late October. But since longtime readers know that I like to parlay 1P Overs at plus-money, I’m going to be less concerned with win percentage and more about winning money. Let’s get to the recap of Wednesday’s action and then look at the NHL card on Thursday for our Best Bets and we hope you’ll see what I mean. And then, as has become our custom around here, we’ll rerun our Wednesday column and update our “takes” based on how the lines are moving.Wednesday Recaps
CBB: No. 4 Alabama beat No. 15 Arkansas 84-69, but it was an upset as Bama was 1.5-point road underdog. No. 25 Marquette (+2.5) upset No. 6 UConn 82-76. No. 10 Texas (-6.5) beat No. 17 TCU 79-75 but didn't cover. No. 1 Houston beat USF 83-77 but didn't cover either.
NBA: Faves went 6-2 SU on Wednesday and 5-3 ATS with the Spurs (+13.5) covering in 135-129 loss at Grizzlies. The upsets were by the Pistons (+6.5 in 135-118 win vs. Timberwolves) and Wizards (+1.5 in 100-97 win vs. Bulls). Home teams went 7-1 SU and 6-2 ATS. Overs led 5-3.
More NBA: On the season, favorites lead 393-223 SU with 9 games closing pick-'em while underdogs still lead 314-284-18 ATS (52.5%). Home teams lead 382-243 SU and 325-283-17 ATS (53.5%). In totals wagering, Overs improved to 324-294-7 (52.4%).