There aren’t many better feelings than starting March Madness off 1-0. Unfortunately, the committee will always make that as hard as possible by throwing a toss-up game in the 12:15 slot on Thursday.
This year is no different: the 9-seed TCU will face the 8-seed Ohio State, with the Buckeyes opening as slight 2.5-point favorites.
Yahoo Sports currently has 60% of brackets taking Ohio State in the first game of the tournament, which is the fifth-closest toss-up among all submitted brackets. Agreeing with the public normally won’t get you far in gambling, but I think I’m going to have to ride with them on this one.
Why to bet on Ohio State
I’ll get into more of my reasons why I like Ohio State in this game, but the biggest factor for me comes down to which team has the better best player. Bruce Thorton is leaving Ohio State as the all-time leading scorer for a university with a very solid basketball history. Thornton has missed the tournament in his first three years as a Buckeye, but made sure that he didn’t leave Columbus without one trip to the dance.
Thorton’s having an uber-efficient senior campaign, scoring 20 points a night on 55/40/83 splits. Thornton, along with his backcourt partner, John Mobley Jr. provide one of the more entertaining guard combos in the country. They shoot the three very well and provide a large majority of the Buckeyes’ offense.
With a guard combo like those two, you might wonder why Ohio State is only an 8-seed. Unfortunately, Ohio State has one of the worst front courts in the tournament, and has been abused inside all season long. What I like about Ohio State so much in this matchup is that TCU doesn’t have an imposing frontcourt that can take over a game.
What to know about TCU
The Horned Frogs have an equally small starting lineup, with 6’8” Xavier Edwards and 6’7” David Punch holding down the small-ball four and five’s. Ohio State does have size with 7’0” senior Chris Tilly, but he has consistently been bullied throughout conference play and has been a weak link for the Buckeyes.
In a single-elimination game against TCU, I think Tilly will be able to hold up long enough for his guards to win.
TCU head coach Jamie Dixon does a great job of running a defense that prevents guards from taking over, but they’ve been too inconsistent this year for me to trust them. Since the start of March, Ohio State is 4-1 and 4th best team in the country according to Bart Torvik. But even across the season, Torvik has Ohio State as the 23rd-best team and TCU as the 49th-best.
I think Vegas is a little off on this one, so I like Ohio State -2.5, and I love them to advance into the round of 32.
