College Basketball Best Bets Today: November 2 Predictions & Picks

The calendar has flipped from October to November, which means the college basketball season is finally here. The action technically began Sunday morning in Rome with Notre Dame’s comeback win over Villanova, but things really get underway Sunday night into Monday morning with the 24-hour Field of 68 Opening Day Basketball Marathon in Rock Hill, South Carolina, featuring a host of mid-major games. From a power-conference perspective, we have a couple ranked matchups in Miami vs Florida and UCLA vs Arizona, as well as a few other intriguing games involving ranked teams like Memphis vs Iowa State, Purdue vs Gonzaga and Ohio State vs BYU. 

In the heat of the football season, the beginning of the college hoops season is often overshadowed, but not here. If you’re here right now, you’re one of the hoops diehards, and you’re just as excited as I am to get this season underway. Here are my favorite plays for the opening-day slate, and don’t forget our CBB predictions for all the biggest matchups throughout the year and all the way through the newly-expanded NCAA Tournament. 

CBB Best Bet: Florida Gators -4.5 over Miami Hurricanes (-110)

Odds available at Caesars Sportsbook at the time of publishing. Playable to -5.5 (-110).

With the return of Malik Reneau and the additions of Somto Cyril (UGA), Robert Miller III (LSU), Egor Ryzhov (EURO) and freshman Caleb Gaskins, the Hurricanes have a good bit of size that matches up well with the towering Florida front court. That said, with the departures of Tre Donaldson and Tru Washington, Miami lost their only reliable perimeter shooters. There’s not a ton of perimeter shot-making on this team in general right now, which could make this offense a bit one-dimensional to start the year. That’s not particularly ideal against the unanimous #1 team in the country in the Gators, which returns a healthy amount of the championship-winning production it had two years ago, including boomerang transfer Denzel Aberdeen and the twin towers, Alex Condon and Rueben Chinyelu.

The combination of Aberdeen and Urban Klavzar provides Florida with a pair of knock-down shooters from range, which should pair nicely with Thomas Haugh’s ability to step out and hit shots. They have some perimeter depth too – something Miami doesn’t have – with Ohio transfer AJ Brown healthy and returning junior Isaiah Brown providing even more shooting off the bench. I’m long on Miami this year in the ACC, but I don’t love this matchup for them on opening night. With a line now sitting under five points, I’m laying it with the Gators.  

Check out my CBB national championship futures to make ahead of the regular season

CBB Best Bet: Wisconsin Badgers -22.5 over Denver Pioneers (-113)

Odds available at bet365 at the time of publishing. Playable to -24.5 (-110).

One of the bigger mismatches of opening day will be in Madison when the Wisconsin Badgers host the Denver Pioneers. The Badgers lost Nick Boyd, John Blackwell and Andrew Rohde, but they return Nolan Winter and Austin Rapp, while they welcome an Australian professional in the backcourt, Owen Foxwell, as well as a couple knockdown shooters in Trey Autry (George Washington) and Eian Elmer (Miami Ohio) in the transfer portal. There’s plenty of talent in Madison this year, including perimeter shooting and extreme size on the interior, which is status quo for the Badgers anyway.

Laying this many points with this many new faces can be unsettling, but there is a massive talent disparity in this matchup. Outside of PG Carson Johnson, there isn’t much here for the Pioneers, who don’t have a single player outside Johnson that averaged more than eight points per game in Division I last year. Eight of the projected top 10 players in their rotation are transfers, mostly from low-level mid-majors and the Division II level. 

To add insult to injury, Denver has essentially no side outside of Babacar Mbengue. He’s the only on the roster listed above six-foot-nine, so I don’t know how the Pioneers compete on the glass against the sizable Wisconsin frontcourt. I like Badgers by 25+ here. 

CBB Best Bet: Ohio State Buckeyes +3.5 over BYU Cougars (-110)

Odds widely available at the time of publishing. Playable to +2. 

Both the Buckeyes and Cougars will look a bit different this year. Bruce Thornton, Devin Royal and Christoph Tilly are no longer in Columbus, while AJ Dybantsa, Richie Saunders, Kennard Davis and Keba Keita are no longer playing for BYU. The Cougars will benefit from the return of veteran PG Robert Wright III and the additions of Collin Chandler and Jaxon Kohler, but defense was an issue last year for BYU, and I’m not seeing much to think it will be much better this year.

OSU coach Jake Diebler brought in Cal transfer Justin Pippen to run point alongside returning guard John Mobley Jr., which is a move I really like. Pippen is a physical point guard that always looks to facilitate, posting a top-100 assist rate in the nation last year, and has a knack for drawing contact, while he was top-100 in steal rate on the defensive end as well (KenPom). Elsewhere, it looks like forward A’mare Bynum is ready to take the next step after a couple productive performances in OSU’s exhibition games. 

Center is a position of concern for the Buckeyes, but fortunately for them, the same is the case for BYU. This game will be played in Utah, but it won’t be at the Marriott Center, which takes a bit of juice away from the BYU home-court advantage. These teams appear to be pretty even to me, so I’ll take the Buckeyes catching more than a possession worth of points.