South Florida-Temple Line at Owls -2.5
The South Florida-Temple line was coming in at Owls -2.5 for Friday night’s NCAA Basketball Tournament game. You can find all the latest betting odds at Belmont.com here. Be sure to claim your FREE CASH bonus when opening an online betting account.
The NCAA tournament is in full swing now and that gives bettors plenty of games to choose from as they finalize their cards. The late night action tonight does feature some good betting opportunities though, starting with the South Florida vs. Temple game.
Belmont line and total: Temple -2.5 and 121
South Florida was one of the last four in the tournament and they proved their worth by dismantling a weak California team on Wednesday night. Having played already, fatigue may be a factor for the Bulls but as long as they continue to play phenomenal defense, this team will be alright.
South Florida only allows 57.2 points per contest and they were able to hold a high-scoring Cal team to under that (54). Temple may be a bit of a different animal though because they are loaded with seniors and love to run up and down the floor, averaging 76 points per game. Offensively, South Florida can’t keep up with that so they will need to shut everything down in their own end.
Temple lost a lot of respect from experts when they failed to win a single game in their conference tournament, spoiling what was a great season at 24-7 SU. Getting the dreaded #5 seed doesn’t help them either as they have been the most frequent to get upset (22 times in last 24 years a #5 has lost), but with #12 VCU winning, the odds may be back in their corner tonight.
Temple is 6-0 ATS in their last six against Big East teams and that includes a blowout 19-point victory against Villanova earlier this year. With the experience they have, they understand the importance of bouncing back strong as they are 12-5 ATS after a SU loss and the stage couldn’t get any bigger than the one they are on tonight.
The Owls have struggled in the past on this stage (0-5-1 ATS last six tournament games) but for seniors like Ramone Moore (17.6 pts/game) and Juan Fernandez (11.4 pts/game) they know that this is their last chance to play high level basketball on this stage and will want to make the most of it. They are two of the top three scorers on Temple and they have seen many defenses try to shut them down in their collegiate careers. South Florida won’t show them anything new and Temple should be composed enough to take care of business in this one.
Lay the points with Temple.
- Matt Skinner, Gambling911.com
