Sweet 16: Gonzaga Bulldogs vs UCLA Bruins

Bruins Have Advantage In Minds of Bettors

The UCLA Bruins are once again in a position to add to their championship resume when they face the Gonzaga Bulldogs who are trying to finally get to the top of the mountain. UCLA finished the season 20-15-1 ATS, with 20 of their 34 games hitting the over. Even though the Bruins failed to cover a 7.5 point spread in their win against Northwestern (68-63) there is no reason to fall off the horse with UCLA covering five of their last six games.

UCLA has cashed ‘over’ tickets in both of their opening-round games to bring their recent trend of overs to five winners in their last seven games. With 14 wins in their last 15 games, moneyline bettors continue to find success despite having to lay huge numbers to be involved.

The Bruins were challenged by the Northwestern Wildcats in the second half after cashing a first-half ticket and leading by 10 at the half, but the Wildcats owned the second half behind Boo Buie who finished with 18 points, despite hitting just five of his 13 shots.

Buie did hit a huge shot with 11:26 to go in the game to tie it up at 45, erasing that 10-point deficit. Dylan Andrews hit two free throws with 20 seconds left (66-60) to put the dagger in Northwestern. Let’s continue our Gonzaga vs UCLA preview by turning our attention to the Zags.

Gonzaga Hopes to Live Up to Dangerous Reputation

Many think this has been a down season for the Zags, but they still lead the nation in scoring (88 PPG) and field goal percentage (52.9%). Mark Few has scheduled a few more quad one and quad two teams, to have his team a bit more battle-tested than in years past.

Despite being a dangerous team on the offensive end, it’s their effort on defense that has kept them from covering more games than in the past. The Bulldogs were just 12-17-1 ATS this season, with 19 of their 30 NCAAB regular season games going over the total.

On the defensive end, Gonzaga will have to find a way to be better than 287th in the nation in points allowed per game (73.6). The Zags have failed to cover 3 of their last four games which includes the West Coast Conference Tournament. Let’s continue our Gonzaga vs UCLA preview by looking at the betting numbers for each team.

Handicapping the Game

We think Bruins will win and cover this game, just to end the suspense. It appears as if the betting public is with us, 64% of the spread money has come in on the Bruins, pushing the opening number of -1.5 in favor of UCLA to -2.5. It appears the public is more interested in bypassing the spread and going right o the moneyline that now sits at -135 after opening -125.

That move has been driven by 72% of the moneyline wagers coming in on the Bruins. Although we’re at the point where all of our March Madness brackets are long gone, this is also the time of the tournament when the professionals can zero in on a few teams rather than having to deal with a typical card that features dozens of games. That makes these moves sharper than normal.

The Bulldogs have a couple of concerning trends starting with a 7-21–2 ATS record against teams over .500 and 10-21-2 ATS following a SU win. The total hasn’t budged off its opening (145.5) but we see just 58% of the early money bet on the over, but not enough to move the number.

This is where the Bulldogs have produced unders with 11 of their last 16 games against teams above .600 cashing tickets. To conclude our Gonzaga vs UCLA preview we’re going to add the under to our UCLA wager. (Odds change frequently, be sure to check for the most up to date changes.)

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