Houston vs. Arizona Bracket Prediction: March Madness Odds
The NCAA Tournament continues Thursday with the first four games of the Sweet 16. No. 5 Houston is coming in off comfortable wins over UAB and Illinois as they look to punch their ticket to the Elite Eight for the second consecutive year. Sitting as the No. 1 seed, Arizona cruised past Wright State before surviving an overtime scare against TCU. The Wildcats are looking to make an appearance in the Elite Eight for the first time since 2015.
Arizona has dipped to a slim 1.5-point favourite to win after opening at -2, while the total sits at 145.0 on the NCAA basketball odds.
Houston vs. Arizona NCAA Tournament Point Spread and Betting
Houston has become a reliable cover option as they’re 5-0 against the spread in their last five games and 24-12 ATS this season. The Cougars’ defence has helped this team trend toward low scoring games. The total has gone Under in seven of Houston’s last nine games and they have held all but one of their last 10 opponents to 68 points or less.
Arizona survived a late scare against TCU, but failed to cover as a 10-point favourite. They also failed to cover as a 21.5-point chalk against TCU, continuing a trend that has seen alternate wins and losses against the spread for most of the year. The Wildcats are riding an eight game win streak and their offence has been aggressive, scoring over 80 points in each of those games.
Houston Cougars (5)
Leading scorer Marcus Sasser, who averaged 17.7 ppg, was lost in December to a season-ending foot injury, but this team has continued to roll. Kyler Edwards has led the offence through two rounds of the NCAA Tournament, scoring 25 points against UAB and 15 points against Illinois. Look to seniors Fabian White Jr. and Josh Carlton to be the difference makers if Houston is able to knock off the No. 1 seed. White is averaging 13 points per game with 5.8 rebounds and he’s become a reliable threat on the perimeter, shooting 38.6 per cent from beyond the arc. Carlton knocks down 11.8 points and 6.3 rebounds per game, but his biggest contribution is his physicality and strength, which he uses to push around defenders in the paint.
Defensively, the Cougars starved most of the Illinois roster, holding four of their starters to a combined 5-for-23 from the field for 19 points. Although they were torched by Kofi Cockburn, who put up 19 points himself and made all seven free throw attempts, this team has generally been defensively suffocating all year. Houston has not lost a game this year when they hit between 70-80 points, but the key here will be focusing on the defensive side of the ball against a high scoring Arizona team.
Arizona Wildcats (1)
Arizona stayed alive in the tournament despite a late scare against TCU, largely because of a clutch performance from Canadian sophomore Bennedict Mathurin. Mathurin followed up an 18-point game against Wright State with a monster 30-point, eight-rebound performance against TCU, knocking down a massive slam dunk and the game-tying three-pointer in the final 1:07 of regulation. The Montreal native scored 11 of the Wildcats’ last 15 points and should be a lottery pick in the upcoming 2022 NBA draft.
The Wildcats have scored 80 or more points in 12 of their last 13 games. Mathurin is averaging a team-high 17.8 ppg, but don’t look past fellow sophomore Azuolas Tubelis or junior Christian Koloko. Tubelis is second on the team with 14.2 ppg and nails 55.2 per cent of his attempts from the floor. He is a major threat in the paint and has scored 20 or more points seven times. Koloko averages 12.7 ppg and provides size and physicality to Arizona’s frontcourt. He’s recorded three straight double-doubles and has 10 on the year, including a 28-point, 12-rebound performance against TCU.
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