The second of two America East semifinals will tip-off at 9 pm et when the Bryant Bulldogs take on the Albany Great Danes. The winner will earn the right to head to the conference tournament final to face the winner of Vermont vs. Maine.
Bryant won the regular season title in the America East, going 14-2 in conference play. One of those four losses came against Albany back on February 6. Can the Bulldogs avoid disaster against the Great Danes tonight? Let’s find out what the oddsmakers think.
Odds via BetMGM Sportsbook
Spread
Moneyline
Total
Albany
Byron Joshua: The Albany guard has been playing his best basketball of the season of late, reaching 20+ points in three of his last five games. He also put up 22 points and three steals in Albany’s impressive win against Bryan last month. He’ll need another performance like that for the Great Danes to have any chance at the upset tonight.
Bryant
Rafael Pinzon: The Bryant guard has been its leading scorer this season, averaging 18.7 points per game along with 3.1 rebounds and 2.2 assists. He put up 22 points in their first tournament game against UMBC so he’ll look to carry that performance into tonight.
Bryant isn’t good enough to be a double-digit favorite in this spot. The Bulldogs come into this game ranking 185th in effective field goal percentage. While that’s certainly better than Albany at 262nd, the gap isn’t wide enough to give me a first impression of laying the points with the favorite.
One of my favorite things that Albany does well is create extra scoring chances. They rank 14th in the country and first in the conference in extra scoring chances per game at +5.5. That’s largely due to their ability to force turnovers at a top 50 rate in college basketball, which will be an important metric against a Bryant team that turns it over on 15.7% of its possessions.
I’ll take the points with Albany tonight.
Pick: Albany +10.5 (-110) via BetMGM
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