NYReb, Box, Fletch, MC, Jmize, doochuk, gman, and so on....

[DirtyBirds]

First of all, big thanks to you guys. This is my first year big time following and capping/playing college hoops and with all of your help I have been doing very well.

Anyway, my question is about the tournaments (conf and the big one)...

How do I go about playing these?

This year has really shown me how huge the home court adv is in college hoops, especially for good teams, as their stadiums are packed with crazy college kids going nuts. (Even though as MC posted a little while ago, road favs have faired the best this year, like 54-56%)

With all games being at neutral sites, teams playing teams with no common oponents(big dance), or teams meeting for the third time (conf tourneys), I don't know where to begin.

Any help and info from any of you guys would be much appreciated. Thanks and keep up the good work!:thumb:

dirty

 

[gjn23]

play slow down defensive dogs in round one/two
play 12-13 seeds
play teams playing on their "home court"

bet less as the tourney goes on

lines get REALLY SHARP the fewer games there are.

 

[doochuk]

All come's down to match-ups for me.......injuries,how well teams ended the season ,how much healthier teams are now compared to earlier in the year and so on and so on......i hate typing otherwise i would into more detail of what all i look at.....but it is numerous angles a person looks at..........good luck

 

[gman2]

*be sure youre aware of the venue for some of these conference tournaments. some are neutral, some arent. off the top of my head:

wcc tourney is on santa claras home floor
horizon title game is on wisconsin-milwaukees home floor
atlantic 10 tourney is on daytons home floor
conference usa is in cincinnati (but not on cincys home floor)

neutral (although some teams still hold proximal advantages)
acc (greensboro)
big east (msg new york)
pac-10 (staples los angeles)
big ten (conseco fieldhouse indiana)
big west (anaheim)
big 12 (american airlines dallas)
mac (gund arena cleveland) (kent draws especially well there)
note: first round of mac tourney is at campus sites before it moves to cleveland
mountain west (pepsi center denver)
wac (fresno california- although i dont think its on fresnos floor)
sec (georgia dome atlanta)

as for betting approaches:

* take a look at teams who have no chance of getting into the dance as an at-large but yet are still capable of winning their conference tourney (in pac-10 i think southern cal and oregon will be great bets) (in sec, someone like an auburn)

* dont get suckered into laying chalk with teams who have already secured ncaa berths regardless. the logic of "they want to be playing well as they head into the ncaas" is garbage in my opinion. ANYONE is beatable in the conference tournaments. nobody is invincible- not stanford, not duke, not pittsburgh. its very fallacious to assume ranked teams will cruise in their conference tournaments. ive seen too many dogs with their lives on the line pull upsets. the games mean soooo much more to the .500 teams and borderline teams.

* on that note- if you find yourself uttering this phrase to yourself while capping a game: "why in the world is (insert ranked team here) only laying 3 or 4 points to (insert a .500 team here)"-- if you find yourself uttering this phrase, consider passing the game or look at the dog. LOTS of short-chalk "they-should-freakin-kill-em" favorites go down in conference tourneys.

hope some of this helped.
at very worst, hopefully the venues helped

 

[Box and one]

Dirtybird,everything that everyone already mentioned is right on the money.
My system of capping changes on how many pts I give to one specific area.
ie....good pts gds get double of what I might already give them.A good shooting 2-gd with a good pt gd get another extra pt.

I, like many others think gd play is the major factor. Look at lyr's final 4.Cuse had GMAC and Duany plus Edelin.[of course a Carmelo had a small factor] Kansas had probaly the best 2-gd in the country in Hinrich plus the front line.Marquette had Wade who was a monster.Texas had TG Ford.
All final 4 teams had great gds that carried their teams.

I'll do a breakdown this week on how capping is different.
Depth,Coaches,RPI's,sites and schedule, and the most important..what kind of defense and how well you play it.Cuses 2-3 zone was a key factor.Kansas didn't play vs many zones in the B-12.But this yr over 4 teams have used it.

But many times all this doesn't mean a damn thing.Lyr in the 1st round game Holy Cross almost beat Marquette.East tenn almost beat Wake,Butler beat Miss St and Louisville.
Damn,all the above I just mentioned gd play,depth,etc went right out the freak'in window when Miss St lost.
I had them making some noise in the tourney.But the noise was the Dawgs packing their bags and the bus driving away in the 1st round.
Hope this helps a little.There are many more cappers that you didn't mention that know a lot more them me.Follow their advice too.

 

[TORONTO-VIGILANTE]

GMAN2 re: its very fallacious to assume ranked teams will cruise in their conference tournaments.

i had to actually look up this word......

fal?la?cious ( P ) Pronunciation Key (f-lshs) adj.
Containing or based on a fallacy: a fallacious assumption.
Tending to mislead; deceptive: fallacious testimony.


had to do a double take.....i almost got this word mixed up with fellatious.....:brows: