College basketball betting odds focus on tournament championships
The Atlantic 10 and Conference USA join in on the conference tournament madness, with CUSA starting Wednesday in Tulsa and the A-10 commencing Thursday on a big stage at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
It ramps the search for college basketball betting odds into even higher gear after numerous titles were decided in recent days and just ahead of the Big Ten and other major conferences launching their post-season playoffs.
The Memphis Tigers went a perfect 16-0 in CUSA play during the regular season, and are understandably heavy favorites to win the conference tournament.
But in the A-10, while the Saint Louis Billikens and VCU Rams top the betting, a half-dozen other teams seem capable of making a run.
The CUSA tournament begins Wednesday with three first round games matching Marshall and Tulane, UAB and SMU, and Houston and Rice.
Thursday fourth-seeded East Carolina takes on fifth-seeded Tulsa, while top-seeded Memphis, second-seeded Southern Miss and third-seeded UTEP entertain Wednesday’s winners.
CUSA will play its tournament semifinals Friday, and the CUSA tournament title game will be played Saturday.
Bodog.eu is listing Memphis, which has won the last two and six of the last seven CUSA tournaments, as a 4/5 favorite to do it again. Southern Miss comes next at 19/10, followed by UTEP at 6/1, Tulsa at 18/1, East Carolina at 20/1, Houston, Tulane and UAB each at 33/1, Marshall and SMU at 66/1 and super longshot Rice at 750/1.
Play begins in the Atlantic 10 tourney Thursday with four first-round games; eighth-seeded Richmond takes on ninth-seeded Charlotte; fifth-seeded Butler, playing in its first A-10 tournament, battles 12th-seeded Dayton; seventh-seeded Xavier, which will probably have to win the conference tournament to keep its seven-season Big Dancing streak alive, goes against 10th-seeded St. Joseph's; and sixth-seeded UMass plays 11th-seeded George Washington.
Friday the top four seeds join in, as St. Louis, VCU (also playing in its first A-10 tourney), Temple and LaSalle take on Thursday's winners.
Saturday's semifinals will narrow the field to two, and the Atlantic 10 tournament championship will be decided Sunday (1 pm ET, CBS).
St. Bonaventure won the A-10 tournament last year as the four seed; this year the Bonnies didn't even quality for the conference tourney, finishing in the bottom four of a beefed-up Atlantic 10.
On the A-10 tournament betting board, Saint Louis is lined as a +175 favorite, followed by VCU at +185, Temple at +350, Butler at +500, LaSalle at +800, Massachusetts and Xavier at +1000, Richmond at +1300, Charlotte and St. Joe's at +1500, Dayton at +2000 and George Washington at +2500.
