{"id":3997,"date":"2009-03-26T11:14:00","date_gmt":"2009-03-26T16:14:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/2009\/03\/gonzaga-north-carolina-betting-preview-for-march-madness-odds\/"},"modified":"2009-03-26T11:14:00","modified_gmt":"2009-03-26T16:14:00","slug":"gonzaga-north-carolina-betting-preview-for-march-madness-odds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/2009\/03\/gonzaga-north-carolina-betting-preview-for-march-madness-odds\/","title":{"rendered":"Gonzaga-North Carolina Betting Preview For March Madness Odds"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=Section1>\n<p class=MsoBodyText><font size=3 face=\"Times New Roman\"><span style='font-size:12.0pt'>The No.4 Bulldogs had a tough time covering their March Madness betting odds during the first weekend of the Tournament, failing to do so in wins over Akron and Western <span class=SpellE>Kentucky.Gonzaga<\/span> struggled in the first half before pulling away for a 13-point win over Akron, and then they needed a last-second shot from <span class=SpellE>DemetriGoodison<\/span> to beat Western Kentucky by two. The <span class=SpellE>Hilltoppers<\/span> game shouldn&#8217;t have been that close given that they shot 35.7% from the foul line, but Gonzaga allowed them to shoot 51.6% from the floor, which is well over the Bulldogs&#8217; season average of 37.4%. However, Gonzaga averaged 51.1% from the field, and this type of offensive efficiency will always give them a chance. <\/p>\n<p> The No.1 Tar Heels covered both of their online betting spreads, as they romped to a 43-point win over Radford, while dropping LSU by 14 in the second round. The story of <span class=SpellE>UNC&#8217;s<\/span> opening weekend was the return of ACC Player of the Year <span class=SpellE>Ty<\/span> Lawson, who scored 21 of his 23 points after halftime in the LSU game. Lawson looked a bit tentative in the first half as he tested his jammed toe, but the point guard exploded in the second half, and he showed how dangerous the Tar Heels are when he&#8217;s leading the attack. This overshadowed a quiet game from <span class=SpellE>TylerHansbrough<\/span>, who hasn&#8217;t been as dominant as most thought he would be. <\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.betonline.com\/betting-edge\/March-Madness-odds-768.aspx\" title=\"March Madness odds\" id=ymp2>March Madness odds<\/a> have given the Tar Heels an 8.5-point spread, which is a little surprising given that Gonzaga has won 11 straight games, and has a head-to-head edge over <span class=SpellE>UNC<\/span>, beating the Tar Heels at <\/span><\/font><st1:place><st1:PlaceName>Madison<\/st1:PlaceName>  <st1:PlaceName>Square<\/st1:PlaceName> <st1:PlaceType>Garden<\/st1:PlaceType><\/st1:place> in 2006. Lawson should be fine and ready to go, but Hansbrough has to play better than he did last weekend. Wayne Ellington is also hitting on all cylinders, putting up 24.0 points in <span class=SpellE>UNC&#8217;s<\/span> two wins, and the Tar Heels are tough to stop when he&#8217;s on. But the Bulldogs are a balanced team who get scoring from a lot of different people, and their defense is tougher than <span class=SpellE>anythingUNC<\/span> has seen so far in the Tournament. Bet on North Carolina for a third consecutive trip to the Elite Eight, but they&#8217;ll fail to cover their <a href=\"http:\/\/www.betonline.com\" title=\"March Madness betting\" id=xw8l>March Madness betting<\/a> spread.<\/p>\n<p class=MsoBodyText><font size=3 face=\"Times New Roman\"><span style='font-size:12.0pt'>All the winning sports betting picks are at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.offshoreinsiders.com\/\"><b style='mso-bidi-font-weight:normal'><span style='font-weight:bold;mso-bidi-font-weight:normal'>OffshoreInsiders.com<\/span><\/b><\/a><span style='mso-spacerun:yes'>\u00a0 <\/span><span style='mso-spacerun:yes'>\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/font><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"blogger-post-footer\"><a\nhref=\"http:\/\/www.offshoreinsiders.com\/\"><b style='mso-bidi-font-weight:normal'>OffshoreInsiders.com<\/b><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The No.4 Bulldogs had a tough time covering their March Madness betting odds during the first weekend of the Tournament, failing to do so in wins over Akron and Western Kentucky.Gonzaga struggled in the first half before pulling away for a 13-point win over Akron, and then they needed a last-second shot from DemetriGoodison to &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/2009\/03\/gonzaga-north-carolina-betting-preview-for-march-madness-odds\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Gonzaga-North Carolina Betting Preview For March Madness Odds<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3997","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3997"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3997\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.joeduffy.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}