Iowa State vs. Miami Sweet 16 Betting Odds and Prediction

The bottom half of the Midwest Region got blown up last week with the No. 11 Iowa State Cyclones and No. 10 Miami Hurricanes doing all of the damage. The former sunk its talons into both No. 6 LSU and No. 3 Wisconsin upsetting each as possession underdogs, while the latter did even more damage taking down No. 7 USC before blowing past No. 2 Auburn in a wire-to-wire job. These teams set the backdrop for double-digit seeds going wild with seven winning outright in the first round and four more punching a ticket to the Sweet 16. Though this region is expected to be the Kansas Jayhawks (-650) to lose going by the odds of winning it at SugarHouse Sportsbook, one of these two double-digit seeds will punch a ticket into the Elite Eight where they’ll square off against KU or the upstart Providence Friars. That feat has only been pulled off 19 times dating back to 1985 with a 10-seed doing so eight times and an 11-seed nine times. My money will be on the No. 10 seed Hurricanes with this being the third time the program has reached a region semifinal under Jim Larranaga’s watch. As great a story T.J. Otzelberger’s kids have been, I suspect the storybook ending goes up in smoke come Friday night.

DraftKings Sportsbook Betting Odds

Iowa State +2.5

Miami -2.5

O/U 133

Betting Odds Analysis

If you can believe it, the Iowa State Cyclones initially hit the board as short 1-point favorites to come out victorious against Miami and advance into the next round. The betting market had none of it however immediately turning the Canes into a 2.5-point favorite by way of 73 percent of the bets and 78 percent of the money going towards the ACC reps. The turn of events should grab the attention of underdog bettors with the Clones cashing tickets five of the last six times they went off the board dogged. On the flipside, Miami stands 5-2 SU and 4-3 ATS when laying points dating back to the beginning of February; the over cashed in all but one of those matchups. Speaking of the total, it opened 133 and remains there even though a majority of the action and handle has gone the way of the under.

Iowa State Cyclones

ISU closed the regular season with two straight losses to Oklahoma State and Baylor (1-1 ATS), and then followed it up with a 72-41 skunking at the hands of Texas Tech in the quarters of the Big 12 tournament. It’s odds of reaching the Sweet 16 were astronomical heading into the first round tilt with LSU, but they have since shortened up to +650 after following the win over the Tigers up with a shocking 54-49 outright defeat of the 3-seed Badgers. After Tyrese Hunter went HAM with 23 points with seven 3-point makes against the Tigers, it was Gabe Kalscheur that helped propel the Cyclones into the second week of the tourney with 22 points on 10 of 19 shooting. So which ISU player comes from out of nowhere to help the Cyclones log another upset that propels it into the Elite Eight?

Miami Hurricanes

Even before the Hurricanes went into Cameron Indoor and scored the 76-74 outright win as 15-point underdogs, I was already touting Larranaga’s kids as one to watch and invest upon on the NCAA tournament futures odds. Though I hedged a bit in the first round not liking the matchup against USC, I easily recovered that loss in round two versus Auburn by taking what turned out to be a laughable amount of points. As it is, my near 300-1 ticket is still alive and the Canes are favored to advance into the Elite Eight! What to do, what to do? I’ll tell you what to do, right the gravy train that Isaiah Wong, Charlie Moore and Kameron McGusty continue to engineer with the trio one of the nastiest remaining in the Madness.

The Wager

So what’s it going to be Weaver? You gonna take your weight in fish with the offense of the Hurricanes, or the Iowa State defense inside the box Hero-San is bringing down the aisle right now! What’s it gonna be Weaver?! Yes, this tirade was a hat-tip to UHF in case you were wondering. Anyway, this is a tough one to gauge from an X’s and O’s perspective. Miami’s strength and ISU’s weaknesses at both ends of the floor. However, the Cyclones have lived off forcing turnovers in this tournament doing so a whopping 35 times. Miami ranks No. 6 in the country at coughing the ball up, so it will be interesting to see how ISU’s offense reacts to being forced to play more half court sets and not being allowed to get into transition off forced turnovers. Miami turned it over a total of seven times against the Trojans and Tigers! The Hurricanes do a much better job of not sending the opposition to the charity stripe, and also happen to be the much better of the two teams at converting when it gets there. ISU has taken advantage of an LSU team in flux and a Wisconsin team that lost its starting point guard in the first half. Miami is 100 percent healthy and determined to at the very least reach the Elite Eight. I’m betting they do exactly just that!