Tuley’s Takes: March Madness Best Bets – Saturday, March 23

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VSiN Analyst Dave Tuley offers his best bets for the NCAA Tournament games on Saturday, March 23.
By
Dave Tuley

Second Round March Madness Best Bets​

The first round of the NCAA Tournament is “in the books,” and we couldn’t be much happier here in the Tuley’s Takes home office. Our brackets are alive and well. Sure, had Kentucky and Auburn winning a couple of games, but so did everyone else, so most of my brackets are in good shape with all of our Final Four teams and even Elite Eight teams still alive. More importantly (at least in the short term, right?) is that we went a very respectable 4-1 ATS with our March Madness best bets in our Tuley’s Takes” first-round column that was posted late Monday night.
On Thursday, we felt it was a pretty chalk card (and was proven right as favorites went 11-5 SU and 9-6-1 ATS), but swept our only two plays with No. 11 seed Oregon +1 in an 87-73 win over No. 6 seed South Carolina and No. 14 Oakland +13.5 in the biggest upset of the opening round, 80-76 over No. 3 Kentucky.


On Friday, we went 2-1 ATS, starting with No. 9 seed Texas A&M +1.5, easily beating No. 8 Nebraska 98-83. We lost on College of Charleston +9.5 in a 109-96 shootout vs. Alabama, but then No. 12 Grand Canyon +5.5 upset No. 5 Saint Mary’s 75-66 late Friday night as a +200 underdog.
Let’s move on to the second round with my two best bets for Saturday’s games with the winners from Thursday, and then we’ll add our Sunday plays to this file by Saturday afternoon.

Saturday Second Round Games​

Oakland +6.5 vs. North Carolina State​

When I picked Oakland vs. Kentucky, I didn’t expect them to pull the outright upset. I was mostly betting against UK’s lack of defense, but after watching both these teams play in Pittsburgh, I kept having the feeling that No. 14 seed Oakland can play with No. 11 NC State and has a decent chance to continue its Cinderella run. With a spread in this range, the Golden Grizzlies just need to keep this to a one- to two-possession game down the stretch. And while we often see these big upsetters come back to Earth in the second round, that’s mitigated quite a bit by playing another upsetter (as opposed to the fact a No. 14 seed would usually be facing a No. 6 seed). Besides, another criticism of these types of teams is that “the stage is too big for them,” but again that’s minimized by having already taken out blue-blood Kentucky.
March Madness Best Bet: Oakland +6.5

Oregon +5 vs. Creighton​

As we wrote in our Best Bets column in the first round, I saw Oregon win the Pac-12 Conference Tournament in person last Saturday night at T-Mobile Arena here in Las Vegas. And that was after knocking off top-seed Arizona in the semifinals. We didn’t feel Oregon got the credit it deserved as a No. 11 seed. We gave the Ducks out as 1.5-point underdogs vs. South Carolina as we actually thought the wrong team was favored and felt more confident as they were bet to 2.5-point favorites before rolling to the 87-73 victory. We’re emboldened to ride them again here, as “they were flattered” by the fact Pac-12 teams went 5-0 SU in the first round and an even more impressive (in our minds here in the Tuley’s Takes home office) at 4-0-1 ATS with the push on Arizona (closed -20) in the Wildcats’ 85-65 win over Long Beach State. The Ducks face a tougher task against Creighton, but I’ll take the team on a serious roll that’s getting points.
March Madness Best Bet: Oregon +5