Michigan Wolverines vs Duke Blue Devils Prediction, Odds and Picks for Tomorrow, 02/21/26

One of the games of the year will take place at Capital One Arena in the nation’s capital on Saturday evening when the Michigan Wolverines and Duke Blue Devils meet in a top-5 matchup. Michigan comes into this contest off a massive road win at Purdue, extending their win streak to 11 – the nation’s 6th-longest. Meanwhile, Duke has recovered nicely after blowing their game at rival North Carolina with 3 wins in a row, most recently taking care of business against Syracuse 101-64 on Monday. 

Duke seemingly matches up well with Michigan on paper, but I find myself pumping the brakes on the Blue Devils in this matchup for a couple reasons. First, I don’t love how they have shown a propensity to let off the gas late in their biggest games, which we saw in losses to Texas Tech and North Carolina and a near blown-lead against Florida – a game in which the Blue Devils led by 9 before Florida clawed back and lost by just 1 after taking a 2-point lead. 

Second, I question Duke’s ability to reach their offensive ceiling against Michigan’s top-rated defense. The Blue Devils operate heavily through Cam Boozer at the basket, sitting in the 94th percentile in both percentage of attempts at the rim and rim-attempt field goal percentage over their last 10 games. When Boozer doesn’t get what he wants, he likes to kick out to the corners for three-point attempts, where the Blue Devils are in the 89th percentile in shot rate over that same span. The issue is, Michigan is in the 97th percentile in opposing rim rate and in the 93rd percentile in opposing corner-three rate over their last 10 games, and it has been a season-long trend with this defense. They’re holding opponents under 60% on shots within 4.5 feet of the rim and under 30% on those corner threes throughout the entire year. 

On the other end of the floor, Duke is almost as good at negating action at the rim, but for my money, Michigan is more balanced offensively – not only from an attempts perspective, but a shot-making perspective. Not to mention, Duke’s defense regresses away from home more than Michigan’s despite a slightly weaker strength of schedule. In road and neutral games, Michigan is 1st nationally in adjusted efficiency, effective field goal percentage allowed and block rate. Moreover, the Wolverines are 10-0 in Quad 1 games and 5-0 in Quad 1A games. It’s Michigan for me in this potential Final Four preview.

Michigan vs Duke best bet: Michigan Wolverines ML (-142) at the time of publishing. Playable to -160 or -3. 

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