{"id":10742,"date":"2010-11-17T21:34:23","date_gmt":"2010-11-18T02:34:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=10742"},"modified":"2010-11-17T21:34:23","modified_gmt":"2010-11-18T02:34:23","slug":"college-basketball-handicapping-illinois-fighting-illini-vs-texas-longhorns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/college-basketball-handicapping-illinois-fighting-illini-vs-texas-longhorns-10742\/","title":{"rendered":"College Basketball Handicapping: Illinois Fighting Illini vs Texas Longhorns"},"content":{"rendered":"

Illinois Fighting Illini vs Texas Longhorns
\nThursday, 11\/18\/10, 9:00 PM EDT, TV:\u00a0 ESPN2
\nOpening Point Spread:\u00a0 Pick
\nCurrent Betting Line:\u00a0 Illinois -2<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
The Texas Longhorns are 2-0 early in the season and now face their first serious test against Illinois on Thursday night<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Illinois has compiled a 3-0 record this season and many are not surprised due to the team returning five starters from a team that went to the quarterfinals of the NIT.\u00a0 \u201cOne of the things we weren\u2019t very good about last year was extending leads, playing with leads,\u201d Bruce Weber said.\u00a0 The Fighting Illini took a big step in changing that weakness in a 85-63 win over Southern Illinois by starting the second half with a 19-4 run.\u00a0 Offensively, the team is shooting 54.4 percent from the field and is led by Demetri McCamey\u2019s 14.7 points per game in scoring.\u00a0 He is also averaging 8.0 assists through three games after ranking second in the nation in assists last year.\u00a0 The team is 3-0 ATS as a neutral court favorite of three points or less and the NCAA basketball lines page has them giving two points.<\/p>\n

The Fighting Illini have six players shooting at least 52 percent from the field and three of those are hitting at a 60 percent clip or better.\u00a0 A key to Illinois season last year was posting a 10-1 record when it made 40 percent of its three pointers, while going 11-14 when falling under that number.\u00a0 The bench has also been a strength in the early going, averaging 33.7 points and outscoring the opponents\u2019 bench by an average of 17.7 points per game. The team has also outrebounded all three opponents and own a +6.3 rebound margin.<\/p>\n

Texas comes in with a new offense and has held its first two opponents to an average of 55.0 points per game on 31.5 percent shooting, including a 7-of-37 (.189) mark from three-point range.\u00a0 The Longhorns opponents have combined for 12 assists against 38 turnovers on the season.\u00a0 \u201cThe biggest thing is we have a group of guys who have really started to do things we need them to do,\u201d said head coach Rick Barnes.\u00a0 \u201cThis is a much different style that we have played in the past.\u00a0 They bought in to it so far, but we know we have a lot of growth ahead of us.\u201d\u00a0 Barnes spent time in Utah studying a new pick-and-roll offense with Jazz coach Jerry Sloan.\u00a0 The team is 8-7 ATS in neutral court games.<\/p>\n

The Longhorns will be playing the Illini for a fifth time in this series and both teams have come away with two victories apiece.\u00a0 Texas is also no stranger to the Garden, posting a 4-4 mark in its previous eight contests in the building in the Barnes era entering Thursday night\u2019s game.\u00a0 During his 12 seasons in Austin, Barnes has registered a school-record 50 career victories against AP Top 25 opponents, guiding his team to a 50-60 record against ranked teams.<\/p>\n

Bettors will notice that the Fighting Illini are 11-4-1 ATS in their last 16 games versus the Big 12 Conference, while the Longhorns are 4-0 ATS versus the Big Ten.<\/p>\n

The college basketball handicappers at Maddux Sports are ready for an explosive day of winners on Thursday night and can\u2019t wait for you to join them!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Illinois Fighting Illini vs Texas Longhorns Thursday, 11\/18\/10, 9:00 PM EDT, TV:\u00a0 ESPN2 Opening Point Spread:\u00a0 Pick Current Betting Line:\u00a0 Illinois -2 Illinois has compiled a 3-0 record this season and many are not surprised due to the team returning five starters from a team that went to the quarterfinals of the NIT.\u00a0 \u201cOne of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":9764,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,1444],"tags":[3267,737,3908,3907,697,3781,496],"class_list":["post-10742","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-college-basketball","category-headlines","tag-big-12-conference","tag-big-ten","tag-bruce-weber","tag-demetri-mccarmey","tag-illinois-fighting-illini","tag-rick-barnes","tag-texas-longhorns"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10742","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10742"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10742\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10743,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10742\/revisions\/10743"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10742"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10742"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10742"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}