2/13 VDay Special - Penn v Princeton - War at the Palestra

[NajdorfDefense]

Well, it's time for this classic rivalry again, one of the 5 biggest in cbb, and I think the line is low.

Princeton @
Penn -12/-13 on the overnite line right now.

Penn is 4-2 ATS Ivies, Tigers are 0-6. Penn is first in the Ivies, Princeton is last, with only one win, at home.

Penn has 121 Sagarin ranking, and 156 SoS,
Princeton has 216 Sagarin, and #287 SoS, that's pathetic.

Penn's played at Cuse, at UNC, at SHall, Nova, Temple. Princeton's been playing Manhatan, VMI, Iona, NDSt, Rutgers out-of-conf. And losing to 298-rated Dartmouth at home.

Penn has beaten Temple and Drexel this year, both of whom have a shot at making the Tourney, Temple just upset A10 leader UMass and has run off 4 in a row.

Penn and Princeton have 7 opponents in common, Penn went 5-2, Princeton went 1-6. Differential in margin of victory was 23ppg. That's fairly sizable. Both lost to SHall, Penn by 9 and Tigers by 38. Penn won at Cornell by 18, Tigers lost by 20. at Columbia by 26, Princeton lost by 8. Penn beat Dartmouth at home by 20 last week, Tigers lost by 1 as a 13-pt favorite. Penn beat Brown at Brown by 16, Princeton lost by 15 as a Pick'em.

Princeton's 'best' game is a 6 pt loss at 114-rated SoCar. Penn's would be a 19-pt win over 75-rated Drexel.

Penn avg 78ppg at home, Princeton 51 on the road.
Penn shoots 48%, Tigers 41%. In conf 48% v 38% for Tigers.
Penn is better at passing, rebounding, blocks, better 3-pt shooting, both 69% FTs.
Penn has won 8 of 10 while Tigers lost 6 of 7.

This line opened at 13.5 last year, moved to 15, Penn won by 19. I expect similar things this year, but the line may not move that much this time. Penn is not as good as when they almost beat Texas in March, but Princeton is much worse - this is *not* your typical Princeton squad, last year they were 5-1 in conf for this game, not 1-5.
The Palestra is one of the toughest places to play in the country, it is a tiny bandbox and the fans literally sit along the sideline in many places.

Penn's new coach will be especially motivated as this is his first, and biggest, home game of the Year. Penn's seniors will not want to end their career v Princeton with anything but a blowout win, they will not let up in this one. Penn played awful in first half last year [shot 30%, tons of TOs] and was still up 10 at the half.

This will not be my biggest bet of the regular season like it was last year, but I'll start with 2 units and hope someone bets the line down for me.

The O/U is a super-low 111, however U has hit 9 of 15 lines under 120 for Princeton. {Penn hasn't played any lined that low.} I'd lean Under, but am afraid of a 66-50 sort of game if 3s are falling, but Princeton's scored under 50 11 times so far. Princeton is 5-10 ATS when the total is this low, showing that slowball doesn't make it a close game by itself.