{"id":22479,"date":"2012-03-24T01:50:35","date_gmt":"2012-03-24T06:50:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=22479"},"modified":"2012-03-24T01:50:35","modified_gmt":"2012-03-24T06:50:35","slug":"2012-ncaa-tournament-east-regional-final-betting-1-syracuse-vs-2-ohio-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/2012-ncaa-tournament-east-regional-final-betting-1-syracuse-vs-2-ohio-state-22479\/","title":{"rendered":"2012 NCAA Tournament East Regional Final Betting: #1 Syracuse vs. #2 Ohio State"},"content":{"rendered":"

2012 NCAA Tournament<\/strong>
\nElite Eight \u2013 East Region<\/strong>
\nSaturday, 3\/24\/12, 7:05 p.m. Eastern, TV: CBS<\/strong>
\n#1 Syracuse Orange (34-2) vs. #2 Ohio State Buckeyes (30-7)<\/strong>
\nTD Garden \u2013 Boston, MA<\/strong>
\nOpening Line: Ohio State -2.5<\/strong>
\nCurrent Line: Ohio State -3<\/strong>
\nOpening Total: 136<\/strong>
\nCurrent Total: 136
\nOdds Courtesy of Bookmaker<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Syracuse
Scoop Jardine and the top-seeded Orange are underdogs for the first time this season.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The top-seeded Syracuse Orange have overcome just about every obstacle that has stood in their way this season on their way to breaking a record for most wins in school history and pulling within one victory of making it to the Final Four from the East Region.\u00a0 But the Orange (34-2) will face their biggest challenge yet on Saturday at Boston\u2019s TD Garden when they meet the second-seeded Ohio State Buckeyes (30-7) as underdogs for the first time in 37 games.<\/p>\n

The Buckeyes (-3, O\/U 136) figure to test Syracuse more than any other team so far with a legitimate big man in the middle in sophomore Jared Sullinger, who could finally be the one to take advantage of Fab Melo\u2019s absence for the Orange.\u00a0 The 7-foot sophomore center who was named Big East Defensive Player of the Year has not been missed much in their first three games of the NCAA tournament, but his ineligibility might prove to be costly here against Ohio State, especially in a half-court game where Sullinger could dominate.<\/p>\n

The key for Syracuse is to try to get out and run like the team did in spurts during a 64-63 win over No. 4 Wisconsin on Thursday in the Sweet 16 and in a 75-59 victory against Kansas State in the third round.\u00a0 The Badgers were able to sink 14 of 27 3-point attempts against the Orange\u2019s 2-3 zone defense in the most recent game, but they were also outscored 30-10 in the paint.\u00a0 Wisconsin lived and ultimately died by the 3-pointer, something the Buckeyes would be smart to learn from heading in this Elite Eight matchup.<\/p>\n

Ohio State just knocked out the team that handed Syracuse its last loss in No. 6 Cincinnati 81-66 behind a game-high 26 points from sophomore forward Deshaun Thomas.\u00a0 Sullinger also added 23 points and a game-high 11 rebounds to help overcome a poor shooting performance from William Buford, who made 1 of 8 shots and finished with four points.\u00a0 Four Buckeyes played 35 minutes or more against the Bearcats, so depth could be a problem against arguably the deepest team in the country.<\/p>\n

Both teams are very sound defensively, with each posting virtually identical statistics in their past five games.\u00a0 Led by point guard Aaron Craft, Ohio State is holding opponents to an average of 62.8 points on 40 percent shooting from the field while the Orange are slightly better at 62.6 and 39.\u00a0 Craft\u2019s play against Syracuse guards Scoop Jardine, Dion Waiters and Brandon Triche could be one of the deciding factors in the game.<\/p>\n

However, the Orange have seen the UNDER cash in four of its last six games compared to the OVER going 9-1 in the previous 10 for the Buckeyes.\u00a0 Ohio State averages 75 points per game and has been even better in the Big Dance while Syracuse\u2019s offensive production has dropped a bit with the team going 2-8 against the spread in its past 10.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t miss out on winning NCAA tournament picks<\/a> and let the college basketball handicappers<\/a> at Maddux Sports line your pockets with cash.\u00a0 March Madness picks<\/a> packages are available now!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

2012 NCAA Tournament Elite Eight \u2013 East Region Saturday, 3\/24\/12, 7:05 p.m. Eastern, TV: CBS #1 Syracuse Orange (34-2) vs. #2 Ohio State Buckeyes (30-7) TD Garden \u2013 Boston, MA Opening Line: Ohio State -2.5 Current Line: Ohio State -3 Opening Total: 136 Current Total: 136 Odds Courtesy of Bookmaker The top-seeded Syracuse Orange have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":194,"featured_media":9769,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,1444],"tags":[6568,1379,4770,9,4661,4660,3,4662,6571,6570,4659,412,463,1180,580],"class_list":["post-22479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-college-basketball","category-headlines","tag-big-dance","tag-east-region","tag-east-regional-final","tag-march-madness","tag-march-madness-betting","tag-march-madness-picks","tag-ncaa-tournament","tag-ncaa-tournament-betting","tag-ncaa-tournament-lines","tag-ncaa-tournament-odds","tag-ncaa-tournament-picks","tag-ohio-state","tag-ohio-state-buckeyes","tag-syracuse","tag-syracuse-orange"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22479","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\/194"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22479"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22479\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22480,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22479\/revisions\/22480"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9769"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}