Rebels take on Wildcats in pivotal SEC battle

NCAA Basketball Betting Lines

02/02/2010 - Lexington, KY (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The 25th-ranked Ole Miss Rebels have the unenviable task of battling the now fourth-ranked Kentucky Wildcats in Lexington this evening in a top-25 SEC tussle.

Ole Miss carried a three-game win streak into Sunday's home clash with Arkansas and was clearly favored in that affair. Unfortunately, the result was an 80-73 loss to the Hogs, dropping the Rebels to 16-5 overall and 4-3 in conference.

As for Kentucky, it won the first 19 games of this season before finally falling to South Carolina last week. Fortunately, the Wildcats were able to get back on track on Saturday with an 85-72 decision over Vanderbilt. There is plenty of reason to be optimistic about tonight's game, as they enter with a 13-0 home record.

Kentucky owns a commanding 96-13 series edge over Ole Miss, and the teams split a pair of meetings a year ago.

Ole Miss is a well-balanced offensive team that has five double-digit scorers in the fold, and the contributions off all those players have led to 80.9 ppg, a strong output for the team. Chris Warren is tops with 16.7 ppg, and he has handed out 72 assists. Terrico White checks in with 15.0 ppg, and Eniel Polynice provides 10.6 ppg and 89 assists. Murphy Holloway (10.0 ppg, 7.0 rpg) and Zach Graham (10.0 ppg) round out the group for the Rebels, who are holding opponents to 69.3 ppg on 40.3 percent shooting. On Sunday, Ole Miss connected on a mere 38.2 percent of its field goal attempts and was outscored 23-9 from the foul line. Those negatives overshadowed a 45-32 rebounding advantage. Holloway tallied 19 points off the bench, and Warren contributed 17. As for Polynice, he finished with 15 points and six assists.

Sure, Kentucky freshman John Wall has been the most highly-regarded player in the nation so far this season, but fellow rookie DeMarcus Cousins is proving that he is just as worthy of praise. Cousins racked up 21 points and 10 rebounds for the Wildcats against Vanderbilt on Saturday, and he seems to get better every time he takes the floor. Darnell Dodson scored 16 points against Vandy, while Wall posted 13 points and nine assists. Eric Bledsoe scored 13 points as well, and Patrick Patterson rounded out a balanced attack with 12 points before fouling out. Kentucky earned a dominant 41-22 rebounding advantage and benefited from 25 points from the foul line. Wall is averaging 16.9 ppg to go with 135 assists and 40 steals, while Cousins provides 16.2 ppg and 9.7 rpg. As for Patterson, a reliable veteran, he checks in with 15.2 ppg and 7.7 rpg. The 'Cats are generating 82.2 ppg while surrendering just 66.0 ppg on 38.2 percent shooting by opponents.

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Sportsbook Betting Lines

Who Makes the Sportsbook Betting Lines?

Las Vegas Sports Consultants (LVSC) is the world’s premier oddsmaking company and the most respected authority on making the lines. Mike Seba is a Senior Oddsmaker at LVSC and has been making lines for the last six years. In our extended interview, Seba explained that there are 4-5 oddsmakers assigned to make lines for each of the major sports (pro & college football and basketball; MLB, NHL, boxing, golf). Each of these oddsmakers bring unique opinions, strengths and weaknesses to the process. Oddsmakers at LVSC are professional sports junkies who love what they do and would probably do it for nothing if you asked them, but they do get paid for it. By necessity their approach is very research-oriented and concise, since with millions of dollars at risk there is little margin for error.

“You either have a passion for it or you don’t,” Seba said.

“The #1 thing for us is to make a line for each game that creates good two-way action. We do this by drawing from past experiences and applying them to current situations. People think it’s much more complicated, but it’s not. “

What are the Football Betting Lines Trying to Accomplish?

There is a common misconception that point spreads represent the oddsmakers’ prediction of how many points the favorite will win by. That is not the case at all – their intent is NOT to evenly split the ATS result between the teams; rather, their goal is to attract equal betting action on both sides. Stated another way, they want to create a line that half the people find appealing to bet one way while the other half find it appealing to bet the other way (known as ‘dividing the action’).

Divided action means the sportsbook is guaranteed a profit on the game because of the fee charged to the bettor (called juice or vig – typically $11 bet to win $10).

How the Opening Line Is Made

The opening line is the first line created by the oddsmakers, which is then sent out to sportsbooks. Of course there is an entire method to the madness on how the opening line is created. Seba explained that it all starts with each oddsmaker creating a line on each game based upon their own personal approach. This usually includes having up-to-date power ratings on each team.

Power ratings are the oddsmaker’s value of each team and are used as a guide to calculate a "preliminary" pointspread on an upcoming game. The power ratings are adjusted after each game a team plays. Examples of non-game factors that would require an adjustment to a team's power rating are key player injuries and player trades.

Once a game’s power rating based pointspread is determined, the oddsmaker will make adjustments to that line after considering each team's most recent games played and previous games played against that opponent. Also, adjustments are made after reading each team’s local newspapers to get a sense of what the coaches & players are thinking going into the game.

Since the oddsmaker’s ultimate goal is equally dividing the sports betting action, public perception and sportsbook betting patterns must be taken into account. For example, the public might have heavy betting interest week after week on a popular college football betting team such as USC. If an oddsmaker comes up with a preliminary line of USC -7, then an adjustment up to -7.5 or -8 would be made in response to the public’s expected USC bias.

The last step in the line-making process for each oddsmaker is taking one final look to determine whether or not the line "feels right." This is where common sense and past experience with how games are bet enters into the picture.

A round-table discussion among the 4-5 oddsmakers involved in making the line for each sport is then conducted and a consensus line is decided upon by the Odds Director before it is released to the sportsbooks. Of the 4-5 oddsmakers, generally the 2 most respected opinions are weighed more heavily by the Odds Director before he decides on the final line.

Why Sports Betting Lines Change

Once the opening line is released by LVSC, the individual sportsbooks decide if they want to make any adjustments before offering it to the public. Reasons for such adjustments include:

Experts working for the individual books having a strong opinion on the game

Individual books having players who consistently bet with certain tendencies (such as an extreme bias toward favorites or toward a certain popular team like USC)

The purpose of these adjustments, like all line adjustments, is to more equally divide the betting action.

Once betting begins, sportsbooks can adjust the line at any time. In doing so they attempt to make more attractive the team that is getting less action. By moving the line, sportsbooks can influence how the public bets on a particular game.

For example, if the pointspread on a game is 7 and most of the money is coming in on the underdog (taking the +7), sportsbooks will then move the number down to 6 ½ to try and attract money on the favorite.

Moving the line is the oddsmaker's effort to balance betting action, and often times such moves can have a major impact on a bettor’s decision. Oddsmakers can also change the line depending on various event-related factors such as player injuries or weather. Obviously, if the line comes out a week ahead of the event (which is the case in football), there is much that could happen during the week leading up to the event that could affect the line. Oddsmakers have to determine if any changes are necessary and send out an "adjusted line."

“The main objective is that our clients get equal action on both sides,” Seba said. “We’re not trying to pick the team that covers the spread, we’re trying to make it a coin flip, a tough decision (for the bettor). If we’ve done that, we’ve done our job.”

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