JEFF ALLEN GAME PREVIEW: VERMONT at NEVADA
The CBI has reached it’s semifinals and tonight World Champion Handicapper Jeff Allen examines the late
offering as the Vermont Catamounts (23-13) out of the America East Conference visit the Nevada Wolf Pack
(21-13) from the Mountain West in Reno. As there is no official seeding in the CBI, Vermont stayed out West
after beating Seattle 73-54 on the road. Nevada will host it’s third straight road game after beating Montana
and Eastern Washington. The line opened with Nevada a -3.5 point favorite with the total set at 145. Wolf Pack
and over money has sent the number to -4.5 and 146 1/2. as of this writing.
Vermont generally has a solid program but the Cats actually may have been a bit down and peaking late here.
They are 9-1 over their L10 after starting the season 14-12 and getting mauled in a pretty pedestrian non-conference
schedule. Their only win of note cam against UC Santa Barbara at home while losing early on to the likes of
Eastern Michigan, Buffalo, Yale, Florida, St Bonny and Purdue. The Cats get very balanced scoring with five players
averaging between 12.0 and 9.3 ppg. Ethan O’Day (11.8, 6.8) is a 6’9″ forward that is the man in the paint.
You can’t say enough about the job that Eric Musselman has done in his first year at Nevada. Nobody has a better
pedigree but Musselman was faced with an almost untenable situation of a program in complete disaray and with
a hodge podge of young kids. The Wolf Pack surprised many immediately by being competitive and more than
held it’s own in conference play. Cameron Oliver (13.0, 9.0) is a 6’8″ freshman specimen at power forward. The
Pack’s best player is Marqueze Coleman (15.4, 4.3, 3.4) was hurt for the MWC tournament but played 15 minutes
in the last game and should be a factor here.
As previously noted, Vermont gets most of it’s scoring from it’s starters and those five all played 30+ minutes Monday
despite winning by 20+. Nevada played just seven (three 34:00 min +) in a similarly easy game on Monday. The Wolf
Pack do have several edges in this game however in that they were able to stay home, bring the best player on the floor
(Coleman) off the bench and have an impossible to handle matchup advantage with Oliver. Vermont has won three of
it’s last for true road games but in the end we like homestanding Nevada to win by double-digits.