Why Notre Dame-Rutgers will end, plus the best March Madness futures bets to make now

I don’t think I’ll sleep well tonight. For me, the night before the NCAA Tournament begins – sorry, the games, but when I follow you you will never count as the tournament to me – no different than the eve of Christmas or the day the end of school for a child. I can only think about waking up on Thursday morning, going down to the living room downstairs, where my wife let me set up multiple televisions for my first weekend and delving into nonstop college basketball.

Seriously, it takes me back to when my mom pretended to believe me when I told her I wasn’t feeling well that first Thursday and I couldn’t go to school. She would take my temperature, stare at the number 98.6 on it, and say, “Well, you have a fever, I better call the school.” At the time, I thought I was just wishing so much to raise my body temperature, but as I got older, I realized that she was just joking around.

I’m happy to keep that tradition alive, even though I no longer have to pretend to be sick. However, I’ll probably hold the thermometer near the bulb for a few seconds just to get the old feeling back. Another March tradition? Rack group. You can never get enough of it, and if you haven’t already, join me. Cover 3 Podcast and I are running a subgroup that will have prizes for the winners, which can include hosting for a day if you like. Maybe I’ll let you write an edition of this newsletter. You can write about how terrible I am at picking games! Just click on this link to start picking winners

When you’re done, kill the remaining hours from now on and earn money reading these stories. Then we’ll dive into a special show NCAA Tournament heavy edition of the newsletter.

And now the first thing I hope is many shining moments for us this March.

All Eastern Times, and all odds through Caesars Sportsbook

🔥 Hot ticket

🏀 Notre Dame compare to Rutgers, 9:10 pm | TV: truTV

• Main trend: Under is 4-1 in Rutgers’ last five games
• Select: Under 134 (-110)

We have two more NCAA Tournament games tonight before the real trading kicks off on Thursday, but I don’t know much about either. Bryant or State of Wright. However, I have seen a lot of Rutgers and Notre Dame. Maybe I’ve seen too many of them. Although I would appreciate it if these two played a better match than the one we endured between Indiana and WyomingI cannot guarantee that will be the case.

Notre Dame is easily the more comfortable attack of these two teams, as it ranks 30th in KenPom’s adjusted attack effectiveness, but the Fighting Irish moves at a slow pace. They also activate a lot of thirds. When Tuesdays don’t drop, there doesn’t seem to be a backup plan other than “throw more at the rim and maybe some will come in.” Seriously, between Blake Wesley, Dane Goodwin, Prentiss Hubb, Cormac Ryan and Nate Lasczewski, the Irishman whose five players have attempted at least 100 triples this season.

Now, that doesn’t sound impressive based on the raw data, but that’s because of how fast the Irish are moving. During the season, 43.1% of their shots were three. Rutgers also move slowly, but shoot poorly and rarely attempt triples. The ranged knights accounted for just 31.4% of the time, ranking 315th nationally. The problem is that they also don’t shoot better on passive, and instead rely on a defense that can be choking. Knights are ranked 42nd nationally for adjusted defensive effectiveness and do a great job of forcing opponents to use most of their shot time before finding a glimpse.

So when you consider the movement speed of these teams, that they’re playing in an unfamiliar location and there’s a lot of stuff out there, I don’t expect a horror movie to score well. However, it is likely to be close, which only contributes to nerve damage that affects offensive performance. Add it all up, and it looks like we’re in for a fight.

Here’s what SportsLine is saying about the game: The SportsLine projection model is slightly tilted towards Notre Dame covering the spread tonight, but it screams at you to take up one side of the total.