College Basketball Best Bets: Houston Will Be a Problem for Rice

Derik Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports

After SI's college basketball Best Bets went 3–0 on Friday, Three Man Weave is back with its two favorite bets for Tuesday night's slate. We're using the current odds at William Hill (as of 11:10 a.m. EST) for these bets.

Houston at Rice

3MW Pick: Houston -12.5

Houston is one of 3MW’s pet teams this year, a squad we think will be much better than public perception. The Cougars eviscerated an unsuspecting Alabama A&M team in their first outing, but then lost a heartbreaking controversial game to BYU in which Nate Hinton was called for a carry with Houston up one and time running out, giving the ball back with enough ticks on the clock for TJ Haws to hit a game-winning jumper. Rice, on the other hand, bounced back from its embarrassing 48-point loss to Arkansas to beat Penn, Northwestern State, and UC Santa Barbara. Scott Pera has improved the Owls each year of his tenure and looks to have a C-USA contender on his hands.

Rice is no pushover, but this game screams Houston for a couple reasons. First is the implied home-court advantage applied to this game. Places like KenPom and bookmakers in Vegas, who normally assign about a three-point value to home, are overrating Rice’s edge here. The two schools are just six miles apart—a mere 11-minute drive down the road. While Rice has been impressive in the friendly confines of Tudor Fieldhouse this year, home-court advantage should be nearly zero in this game.

Second is the physicality and interior advantage that Houston will enjoy. Rice was able to compete with the less athletic and less physical Penn and UCSB squads, but the Cougars are a different animal. Much like Arkansas, Houston should overwhelm Rice with its athletes, get to the rim at will, control the offensive glass, and score on the block with ease. Rice is currently 299th in FG% allowed near the rim this season, per Hoop-Math, and finished 308th last year in the same stat. The Cougars do not over-rely on getting to the rim to score, but they will take advantage when able with perimeter guys like Hinton, DeJon Jarreau, Caleb Mills and Quentin Grimes and a legit big man in Fabian White.

The third reason to like Houston in this game is its ability to shut down transition opportunities, a staple of Rice’s offensive game plan under Pera. Houston has been among the national elite the past few seasons at limiting transition chances and controlling the pace of the game. The Rice-Houston game last season was just 64 possessions, a clear indication of who won the tempo battle. Now, lower possession games usually favor dogs, but when the slower favorite is able to score at will, that possession count becomes less important.

The one thing to be concerned about if you’re a Houston backer tonight is Rice’s ability to shoot the three. Last year, the Owls were able to cover at Houston thanks to an 11-for-27 three-point shooting performance, and the Cougars ranked just 271st nationally in three-point rate allowed in 2018-19. However, due to Houston’s ridiculous length on the perimeter (they start 6’5”, 6’5”, 6’5” in the backcourt), it ranked first in the country in three-point defense in 2018-19 and usually makes it tough on shooters to find the bottom of the net. If Rice doesn’t shoot 35-45% from deep in this game, covering the spread will be challenging; however, if shots fall and the crowd starts to get into it, Houston may struggle to win by more than 12. Ultimately, I bank on the Cougars disrupting a smaller backcourt that can be prone to poor decision making. 

Charleston at Marshall

3MW Pick: Charleston -2

The closer a line gets to pick’em, the simpler the calculus becomes on which side to take. The less there is to worry about in terms of late missed free throws, backdoor covers, etc., the less maddening a game is to wager on. Of course, a line of -2 leaves some room for shenanigans, but this becomes more of an exercise in picking who will win. When teams are this close to evenly matched, I prefer to side with the best player, and although the development curve of Marshall’s Taevion Kinsey is pointing almost directly up, that honor in this game belongs to Charleston’s Grant Riller.

Riller, a dark horse All-American candidate, makes the Cougars’ offense especially potent. Offenses with a go-to star as the lead ball-handler have a much easier path to high efficiency, and Charleston epitomizes that roster construction. Riller is a true offensive engine, a pick-and-roll wizard who can create his own shot or find open teammates when opponents collapse on his devastating drives. He’s a well-built 190 pounds, and his combination of finishing at the rim and knack for drawing contact make him nearly unstoppable once he gets his momentum going toward the hoop.

What really weaponizes Riller, though, is the spacing around him. Brevin Galloway, Zep Jasper and Jaylen McManus can all punish defenders who over-help on Riller, and Charleston coach Earl Grant can even play a stretch five with sixth man Sam Miller. Miller should be especially crucial in this matchup, as his versatility away from the basket could render Marshall leviathan Iran Bennett (6’9", 300 pounds) unplayable.   

Marshall, on the other hand, currently has a void in the primary creator role. The Herd have a budding star on the wing in Kinsey, a skilled big in Jannson Williams, and a quick scorer in Jarrod West, but they haven’t been able to replicate the “straw that stirs the drink” element now that Jon Elmore has sailed off into the sunset. Furman transfer Andrew Taylor was supposed to be that piece, but he did not receive a waiver from the NCAA and is not yet eligible. Thus, Marshall gets nearly all of its points in transition or via one-on-one play (329th nationally in assist percentage), and against Charleston’s physical man-to-man (Grant was a Gregg Marshall assistant for years), that approach will really struggle.

This is no gimme. Charleston is hitting the road for the first time this season, although that concern is mitigated by having such an experienced team: the Cougars rank 53rd nationally in “minutes continuity,” a measure of how similar the team’s roster is to last year, and the primary rotation consists of three seniors, two juniors, and two sophomores. Meanwhile, Marshall is coming off a really strong effort at Notre Dame, and the combination of Williams, Bennett and Cam Brooks-Harris has made scoring inside the arc difficult. Thus, the Cougars’ shooters need to hit a few early shots to loosen up the Herd’s defense; if they do, they should leave Huntington victorious. 

Season Record: 7-5