The Virginia Cavaliers have made a killing all season long taking care of the teams they really should be taking care of, especially here at John Paul Jones Arena. Theoretically, the N.C. State Wolfpack don't really stand that much of a chance of anything better than a high single-digit defeat on Monday night.
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HOW THE N.C. STATE WOLFPACK CAN COVER THE SPREAD
Possessions are obviously going to be limited here for the Wolfpack against a stout UVA defense, and the bottom line here is that they're just going to have to come out with guns blazing and outshoot that defense. The Cavaliers have allowed teams to hit 34.6 percent from beyond the arc this season, a somewhat high number considering the fact that they rank No. 3 in the land in total defense. It's doable to get points on the board three at a time, but the Wolfpack are going to have to far exceed their norm to cover this game.
No one on this team is nearly a good enough sharpshooter to be counted upon with regularity, and the problem all of the NCSU shooters are going to run into here is that they're all relatively short going against a lanky and athletic defense.
N.C. State does average 75.3 points per game, and you never know what Cat Barber is going to go on a tear and light things up, but he doesn't have a good history against great defensive teams, and he'll need to exceed his own expectations and come near his average of 23.5 points per game to give his team any chance whatsoever.
HOW THE VIRGINIA CAVALIERS CAN COVER THE SPREAD
The Cavvies will likely just have to do enough offensively to get into the low-70s in this game to cover the spread. You don't think of UVA as a great offensive team, but shooting 49.5 percent from the field, 40.4 percent from distance and 75.0 percent from the charity stripe are all numbers in the Top 20 in the nation.
Anthony Gill is going to need some help in the paint if the Wolfpack choose to go big, so Mike Tobey could be a name to watch out for. He had 10 points off the bench against Virginia Tech on Tuesday night, and if he does that again in this one, we have no doubt that Virginia will put enough points on the board to win and cover this game with ease.
ANALYSIS AND ODDS PREDICTION
Virginia is only 10-12 ATS overall and 5-5 ATS here at John Paul Jones Arena, but it really feels like it's easily the right side in this basketball game.
Go back and look at what the Cavaliers have done lately on defense. They've held their last four foes to 50 points or fewer, and though that streak will certainly come to a close at Duke on Saturday, we can't see the Wolfpack getting to even 60 in this one without one heck of a shooting day.
Maybe the Cavaliers suffer a bit of a hangover from the Duke game in this one, but we can't imagine that in 40 minutes, they won't lock down Barber and the largely one-dimensional Wolfpack.
Virginia 69, N.C. State 54
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