The Duke Blue Devils have been anxious to get back on the hardwood. We have not seen Duke play in a week and a half as the players have been dealing with finals. That has given this team plenty of time to stew and wonder what went wrong in its loss to Boston College. The Blue Devils are well-rested and looking to show that a letdown like that will not happen again. This puts the Evansville Aces right in the crosshairs on Tuesday night.
This war on the floor will go down Tuesday, December 20, 2017, at 7 p.m. ET at Cameron Indoor Stadium in Durham, North Carolina. The game will be televised live on ESPN2. We'll have NCAA basketball odds at BookMaker.eu available for this and every game on the college basketball Tuesday schedule.
Opening College Basketball Odds at BookMaker.eu
This will be the first ever meeting between the Aces and the Blue Devils.
Evansville has been one of the best teams in the Missouri Valley so far this season. The Aces are sitting at 10-2 and have picked up some nice wins against other mid-majors in the early going. They are 6-2 ATS and led by a defense that has been very good to this point. That has led to the under posting a record of 5-2-1.
Duke is just winning games by outscoring people. The Blue Devils don’t have a strong defense, but the offense has been electric and has been the key to their success. They are averaging 93.3 PPG thus far, a number that is second-best in the nation. Duke is 7-3 ATS this year and amazingly the over has cashed in every single one of its games.
Key Stat
Although Evansville focuses on defense first and foremost, this team has some great perimeter shooters. In fact, you might be surprised that the Aces are actually the best three-point shooting team in the country.
Evansville is knocking down 49.1 percent of its threes this season. Three players are primarily responsible for this extremely high figure and interestingly enough, two of the three shoot better from behind the arc than they do inside of it.
Ryan Taylor is hitting 42.2 percent of his shots, but 47.6 percent of his triples while Blake Simmons is knocking down 48.9 percent of his field goals and 53.3 percent of his threes. The only one that follows the typical pattern is the team’s best shooter, Dru Smith, who is hitting 64.1 percent of his field goals and 57.1 percent of his threes.
Matchup to Watch
Evansville has a solid defense, but it has not played anyone with the talent of Duke all season long. The Blue Devils have a number of solid scoring options that can make you pay.
Marvin Bagley III is a budding star. The 6’11 freshman phenom is averaging a double-double and is hitting better than 60 percent from the field this season. He has some solid low-post moves already and is good in transition too.
The Blue Devils still have everyone’s favorite villain too in Grayson Allen. When the team needs a three, Allen is still the one they turn to. He is hitting 43 percent of his threes on the season and is the second-leading scorer on the team.
Free College Basketball ATS Picks
As good as Duke has been, it has two flaws. The Blue Devils have real trouble shooting the three outside of Allen, and they struggle playing defense too. Duke is outside of the top 100 in almost every major defensive category and that is something that Mike Krzyzewski has reminded his team of during its hiatus.
Evansville played on back-to-back nights over the weekend and will not be as well rested as Duke. The Aces do play a very deep rotation, but will be facing a Blue Devils squad that has had a lot of time to rest.
College Basketball Odds: Duke 87, Evansville 64
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