Colorado (10) vs. Marquette (2) Bracket Prediction: March Madness Odds
The Golden Eagles are priced as 4-point favourites on the college basketball odds.
Colorado vs. Marquette NCAA Tournament Point Spread and Betting
The winner of this game faces either No. 11 NC State or No. 14 Oakland in the Sweet 16 – the bottom half of the South bracket really opened up for Marquette with both No. 3 Kentucky and No. 7 Florida losing in the first round. To win the South as of publication, Marquette is a +300 second favourite behind top-seeded Houston and Colorado is +900.
Marquette is 3-1 all-time against Colorado, but they haven’t played since January 1987. MU head coach Shaka Smart is 1-1 all-time against CU, with both coming when he was at Texas. Smart’s team did face a Pac-12 school this year (Colorado and many others will be in the Big 12 next season) and beta UCLA by two points in a November neutral-site holiday tournament. UCLA beat Colorado by four in their lone matchup. The Buffs didn’t play a Big East team.
Colorado Buffaloes
Colorado continued the trend of at least one First Four team advancing to the Round of 32. It has now happened every season but one. The Buffs were 3.5-point favourites when they beat fellow No. 10 seed Boise State by seven in the First Four and actually 1.5-point favourites in the first round against No. 7 Florida – a team we told you to fade due to a pre-tournament injury to 7-footer Micah Handlogten – and beat the Gators 102-100 on Friday. KJ Simpson hit a jumper with less than two seconds left to for the winner. Frankly, it should have never gotten to that point as CU largely dominated. The Buffs shot 63 per cent from the field and 60 per cent from deep and scored their second-most points of the season. It was the highest-scoring March Madness game since 2007 and tied for 17th as the highest-scoring event game in history. Colorado has back-to-back NCAA Tournament wins for the first time since the 1955 Buffaloes advanced to the Final Four. The 102 points were also the most ever by the Buffs in the tournament.
Marquette Golden Eagles
I was not particularly high on Marquette entering the Dance because All-American point guard Tyler Kolek missed a handful of games at the end of the season due to injury. He looked just fine in his return Friday in an 87-69 win over No. 15 Western Kentucky with 18 points, 11 assists and six rebounds. Kam Jones had 28 points on 10-for-16 shooting. That’s about as good as a 1-2 punch as you will find nationally. The Golden Eagles opened the second half with a 17-3 run and never looked back. Marquette became only the second team in the last 20 years to trail by at least seven points at the half in a NCAA Tournament game and outscore its opponent by at least 25 points in the second half.
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