With the first Monday in January we only have FIVE games that made it onto the CBB DFS landscape (4 on FanDuel) but that’s enough for an article as we are in a nice 2-3 month CBB DFS stretch right now with NFL coming to a close and before MLB ramps up. College Hoops is a fun secondary sport to add on with NBA or NHL during these cold winter months and it’s been a profitable one for me historically. I hope to guide you along the way and do not sweat playing a single lineup in cash and tournaments — or go the route of just throwing in some tournament builds and letting the chips fall where they might.
Even turning $25 into $250 during College Hoops is worth the fast sweat that it provides.
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COLLEGE HOOPS TIPS & TRICKS
There are three things that make CBB Hoops a sport you can apply a stack style build to your lineups.
The pace differences are bigger than in NBA: If you play NBA you know that pace is a factor, but it’s generally not the all being factor. Well in College Hoops the difference in pace can be much larger given the shot clock being longer and the talent levels/styles of teams being far more drastic. So we definitely want to focus on a high pace game and prefer ones where both teams play up at a higher pace.
Limited Bench: Another major difference between College and NBA? The NBA has set rotations on a nightly basis and a lot of times 8-9 guys are going to see enough minutes to draw down usage. Not always the case in CBB as many teams will usually just have 6 or 7 core guys who get the minutes.
Focused Usage: Because teams aren’t as deep here, we get focused usage generally on 1-3 players per team, which makes it easier to just grab the top plays in a given game and go from there.
My favorite build methods
I apply a 3-2-2-1 or 3-3-2 build style to most of my lineups. That might ring a bell if you play MLB DFS and generally do a balanced stack approach, and it’s kind of the same thing here. I want to focus my exposure on a couple of games and then fill in with the best one off value or one off stud outside of those 2 core games I want to focus on per lineup.
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Maryland vs Iowa
I have said this in various spots all year long and I will repeat it here again. Outside of Purdue, the B10 is not a good conference this season and everyone else is trying to figure themselves out. Someone in this conference is likely to get it figured out before the tournament and make a sneaky big run but for now whenever you have two teams facing off and a big spread, you take the points — especially when its a home dog.
In this case though Iowa is laying 8 at home and while Maryland has gone through a coaching change I still think they have a good amount of talent compared to an overrated Iowa team.
Maryland will need to have a big game from beyond the arc, which points to Eric Ayala (32% 3pt on 6.4 per game) and Donta Scott (36% on 4.2 per game) being the logical choices. Give me the wing (Ayala) in that scenario and if Qudus Wahab can avoid road foul trouble he should haul in a good amount of rebounds tonight too.
For Iowa Keegan Murray could wind up doing all the damage but for $9,000 you essentially need him to hit 45 to 50, which is viable but if this game is going to go over like I expect (hope?) then Jordan Bohannon or Patrick McCaffery are going to have to have ceiling games. The chances of both doing that are very low, so if we can fit in Keegan as the single play then do that, otherwise go with Jordan or Patrick.
- MD: Eric Ayala, Qudus Wahab
- Iowa: Keegan Murray … or … Jordan Bohannon
Colorado vs Oregon
Both of these teams play very slow but then so does everyone else on this slate. Colorado has not played since December 18th while Oregon played on Saturday.
The Ducks should win this game and cover the -7.
- Colorado: Keeshawn Barthelemy
- Oregon: Will Richardson, DeVion Harmon
Washington vs Arizona
Arizona has been a top team so far this year and they play with the 4th fastest tempo while Washington is 24th. Needless to say this should be an Arizona blowout with a lot of possessions in it and logically there’s production that will come here for us on a short slate.
Bigs will tear up Washington and there should be a ton of rebounds in this game, which makes me want to look at Azuolas Tubelis ($8,500) and Christian Koloko ($7,600) as the better pay up options instead of Bennedict Mathurin who might not be called upon to do as much in a blowout. Reserve guard Justin Kier ($4,200) could see a minutes boost tonight if this game is out of hand and gives you the best value option on the Arizona side as they’re all priced up.
Everyone on Washington is cheap … because they suck? Daejon Davis for $3,900 though is very tempting.
- Washington: Daejon Davis
- Arizona: Azuolas Tubelis, Christian Koloko, Justin Kier
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POSITIONAL NOTES
I always break down the players into three pricing tiers. 7k and up is the High range, 5500 to 6900 is the mid range and 5.4k and below is the value/low end range. Anyone who is 8k and above has to be in a dominant spot or on a slate with limited scoring on it. Generally if you can find a balanced lineup in the mid range with 1 or 2 value plays and one high end play you will have the most success. Going stars and scrubs in College Basketball is a MME build only in my mind on these larger slates, there’s just no need for all that risk.
DraftKings has a lot of G/F players today, so I am just going to combine the positions together into the tiers, you shouldn’t have a hard time making things fit.
All Players
Tier 1 (7k and up)
- G/F – Keegan Murray – Iowa – $9,000
- G – Eric Ayala – Maryland – $7,900
- F – Christian Koloko – Arizona – $7,600
- G – Will Richardson – Oregon – $7,300
Tier 2 (5500 to 6900)
- G/F – Bryce Fowler – Sacramento State – $6,500
- G/F – Jarod Lucas – Oregon State – $6,200
- F – Qudus Wahab – Maryland – $5,900
Tier 3 (5500 and below value)
- G – Daejon Davis – Washington – $3,900
- G – Keeshawn Barthelemy – Colorado – $4,600
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FAVORITE CORE
Eric Ayala – Maryland – $7,900
Bryce Fowler – Sacramento State – $6,500
Daejon Davis – Washington – $3,900
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ONIONS! – Contrarian Play
Johnny Davis – Wisconsin
Hard to find someone who is super contrarian tonight but Davis is probably the one that gets overlooked the most against a good Purdue team. If Wisconsin wants to hang with the best they will need their best to push things.
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BETS
Oregon -7
Maryland +8
Washington/Arizona UNDER 152.5
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