No.22 Virginia takes on Clemson in ACC affair

NCAA Basketball Betting Lines

02/14/2012 - Clemson, SC (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The 22nd-ranked Virginia Cavaliers continue their Atlantic Coast Conference road swing with a visit to the Littlejohn Coliseum to square off with the Clemson Tigers.

This will be the 119th battle between the Cavaliers and Clemson. Virginia holds a 68-50 lead in the all-time series after its 65-61 victory in the contest played on Jan. 31st this season. The Cavaliers shot 55.8 percent from the floor to push past the Tigers in this year's initial meeting.

Head coach Tony Bennett's team comes in with a 19-5 overall record and a 6-4 mark in league play after its 70-52 loss to the North Carolina Tar Heels on Saturday. The Cavaliers hung tough in the first half and went into the intermission trailing by only three points before the Tar Heels ran away with it. Virginia's first four losses had been by a combined 10 points. Virginia is an elite team defensively as it ranks second in the nation in scoring defense with an allowed average of just 51.9 ppg on 38.9 percent shooting. Only five teams have eclipsed the 60-point mark against the Cavaliers this season. Virginia's focus on the defensive end has left it with a sub par scoring average of 63.5 ppg.

Forward Mike Scott continues to lead Virginia with averages of 17.1 points and 8.2 rebounds per game. Scott is leading the ACC in field goal efficiency with a connection rate of 59.8 percent. Joe Harris complements Scott nicely from the guard slot. Harris is the team's second leading scorer with 12.5 ppg after he went 2-of-9 from the field to score eight points against Florida State. Jontel Evans is the top distributor for the Cavaliers as he his dishing out a team- high 3.8 assists per contest.

Clemson snapped a three-game losing streak its last time out with a decisive 78-58 victory over Wake Forest on Saturday. The decision made Clemson 12-12 overall and 4-6 in league action. The Tigers shot 58.2 percent from the field and made 8-of-18 from three-point range in the contest with the Demon Deacons. The offensive showing was encouraging, as Clemson has now shot above 35 percent from beyond the arc in two straight games. The Tigers are averaging 65.3 ppg. Brad Brownell has shown to be a defensive-minded coach this season as his team is second in the league in scoring defense, allowing a mere 60.3 ppg.

Clemson is led by the duo of Andre Young and Tanner Smith. Young is averaging a team-best 13.6 ppg on 40.9 percent shooting from the field. The senior guard has scored in double-figures in three-straight games coming into tonight. Young's field goal percentage has not been superb as of late, as he has gone 14-of-37 from the floor in his last three games. Smith plays well opposite the 5-9 Young in the backcourt, as he is second on the team in scoring with 11.3 ppg. Smith chipped in 20 points and five assists versus Wake Forest. Devin Booker provides inside toughness for the Tigers and is coming off of a nine- point, seven-rebound outing.

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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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