{"id":27318,"date":"2013-01-17T12:18:22","date_gmt":"2013-01-17T17:18:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=27318"},"modified":"2013-01-17T12:18:22","modified_gmt":"2013-01-17T17:18:22","slug":"ncaa-basketball-picks-northwestern-wildcats-vs-illinois-fighting-illini","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/ncaa-basketball-picks-northwestern-wildcats-vs-illinois-fighting-illini-27318\/","title":{"rendered":"NCAA Basketball Picks: Northwestern Wildcats vs. Illinois Fighting Illini"},"content":{"rendered":"

Northwestern Wildcats at No. 23 Illinois Fighting Illini
\nThursday, 1\/17\/12, 8:15 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 Big Ten Network
\nOpening Point Spread:\u00a0 Illinois -10.5
\nCurrent Betting Line:\u00a0 Illinois -10.5
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 132
\nCurrent Total:\u00a0 131.5
\nOdds Courtesy of Bookmaker<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"The
The Illinois Fighting Illini have won 28 of their last 30 home games against the Northwestern Wildcats<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Northwestern has lost three of its last four games, including a 70-50 setback to the Iowa Hawkeyes Sunday, while going UNDER the posted total of 133.5.\u00a0 \u201cThere\u2019s so much pressure on your defense to make stops, but then you can\u2019t score at the other end,\u201d stated Wildcats coach Bill Carmody.\u00a0 The Wildcats are 4-1 in games played away from Evanston this year, which is important to consider when making your NCAA basketball picks Wednesday night.\u00a0 Northwestern is 4-3 ATS as an underdog this season, with the OVER going 5-2 in that situation.<\/p>\n

The Wildcats have two probable starters averaging in double figures, with senior guard Reggie Hearn leading the way in scoring 13.7 points per game.\u00a0 Northwestern is seventh in the nation with a 1.47 assist-to-turnover ratio, as it has committed just 10.9 turnovers per game.\u00a0 Of the team\u2019s first seven Big Ten Conference games, five have been against ranked teams.\u00a0 Defensively, the squad is holding opponents to 62.2 points per game, which is better than the 68.2 mark it finished with last year.<\/p>\n

Illinois has dropped back-to-back games, including a 74-51 blowout loss to the Wisconsin Badgers as 6.5-point road underdogs, while going UNDER the total for the third time in four contests.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m going to evaluate every guy, starting with competitive, physical, mental toughness type plays,\u201d stated Fighting Illini first-year head coach John Groce.\u00a0 The Fighting Illini should bounce back in this affair, as they\u2019ve won 28 of their last 30 home games against the Wildcats.\u00a0 Illinois is 3-6 ATS as a favorite this season, which should be considered when looking over the college basketball odds page.<\/p>\n

The Fighting Illini are 8-1 at home this season, as they\u2019ve lost consecutive game at Assembly Hall just once over the last three years.\u00a0 Illinois is led by the play of senior guard Brandon Paul, who had his career-long streak of 17 games scoring in double figures come to an end Saturday at Wisconsin.\u00a0 He joins up with Tracy Adams and D.J. Richardson to average 55.7 percent of the team\u2019s scoring.<\/p>\n

Sports bettors will likely play the total, as the Wildcats have gone OVER the total in their last four games as road underdogs of 9.5 to 12 points.<\/p>\n

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

Northwestern Wildcats at No. 23 Illinois Fighting Illini Thursday, 1\/17\/12, 8:15 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 Big Ten Network Opening Point Spread:\u00a0 Illinois -10.5 Current Betting Line:\u00a0 Illinois -10.5 Opening Total:\u00a0 132 Current Total:\u00a0 131.5 Odds Courtesy of Bookmaker Northwestern has lost three of its last four games, including a 70-50 setback to the Iowa Hawkeyes Sunday, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":26018,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,1444],"tags":[4011,3442,6417,697,3119,7204],"class_list":["post-27318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-college-basketball","category-headlines","tag-assembly-hall","tag-big-ten-conference","tag-brandon-paul","tag-illinois-fighting-illini","tag-northwestern-wildcats","tag-reggie-hearn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27318","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=27318"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27318\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27319,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27318\/revisions\/27319"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26018"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}