Basketball Sports Betting

How to Bet on Basketball. Basketball betting is the 2nd most popular sport in the North American betting markets each year behind football, and when the NCAA tournament arrives – otherwise known as March Madness – basketball betting handles skyrocket for sportsbooks during that three-week period. Ranking the Top Basketball Betting Sites There are hundreds of real money sites for basketball betting out there, so ranking them is not an easy task. It requires time and effort, alongside expertise in online gambling and a proper process designed to dissect all important factors. Basketball betting Pinnacle offers the best Basketball odds and highest limits for Basketball betting.

• Basketball Sports Betting
• Basketball Sports Betting Model

A number of conferences have scheduled back-to-back games at a single site in consecutive days. Some, like the Mountain West Conference, gave teams a day in between games. Some of the results have been head-scratchers.

On New Year’s Eve, Boise State won its seventh straight game, pummeling lowly San Jose State 106-54. Two days later, the Broncos needed an Abu Kigab jumper with two seconds left to escape with an 87-86 victory over the Spartans.

And that wasn’t even the weirdest two-games series that week.

Colgate, the Patriot League favorite, didn’t even begin its season until a few hours before Kigab’ heroics. The Raiders showed no rust, racing to a 26-7 lead over Army, en route to a 101-57 win. Colgate shot 65% from the field, including 29-of-38 from 2-point range.

The next afternoon, the Raiders found themselves trailing the Black Knights by 11 at halftime. Army survived a second-half surge by Colgate and won a shocker, 75-73.Colgate hasn’t lost since.

While San Jose State’s and Army’s second-game reversals were extreme, they were also part of what appears to have become a trend — or a couple of trends.

Between Wednesday and Sunday, there were 88 games played as part of back-to-back games between two conference foes on consecutive days at a single site. For our purposes, we’ll be looking at 86 of those because Detroit and Youngstown State were pick’em in their first of two.

Teams that covered the spread in the first game found the return matches more challenging. They were 22-21 SU but just 17-25-1 ATS in the rematches.Favorites that failed to cover in the first games were 10-6 straight up and 9-7 ATS in the second. Those numbers include a couple of perplexing results.

Bryant was cruising atop the Northeast Conference standings before losing back-to-back games at previously 3-9 Fairleigh Dickinson. Even stranger, Winthrop, a 12.5-point favorite, squeaked by UNC Asheville 84-80 on Thursday to run its record to 16-0. But the Eagles fell 57-55 the next evening.Combined scores in these rematches rose from 135.2 points per game to 140.7.

The strongest trend might involve teams that won big in Game 1. Those that posted double-digit victories the first nightwere just 2-9-1 ATSthe next. Five of the 12 teams lost outright.

And in most cases, the differences were drastic. Some examples:

• South Dakota beat Omaha by 32 on Friday and four on Saturday. The Coyotes were favored by eight and 10.5, respectively.
• Binghampton routed New Hampshire by 21 on Saturday while getting 6.5 points. New Hampshire covered Sunday’s 4.5-point spread, 71-65.
• UC Santa Barbara beat UC Davis 72-51 as an eight-point favorite and 89-86 while favored by nine.
• The average swing in the 12 games was 17.4 points.

Sportsbooks bumped the pointspreads by an average of one point in favor of the first-game winners.

Thereis a month left in the regular season, plenty of time to watch these numbers.

Basketball Sports Betting

Here are this week’s picks. The numbers for the spreads are based on game predictions at KenPom.com.

Belmont -12 at Eastern Illinois: The Bruins have flown mostly under the radar, despite the fact that they haven’t lost — a shocking 13-point home loss to Samford — in nearly two months.

It’s a down year for the Ohio Valley Conference — Belmont is the only team among the top 150 at KenPom — and Eastern Illinois struggled, nonetheless.

The Panthers have lost eight in a row since an upset of Murray State, and six of those losses came by double digits.Belmont’s shooters will be tough on Eastern Illinois’ 287th-ranked defense. BELMONT

BYU -18 at Portland, total 144: The Pilots don’t play much defense, and they don’t spend a lot of time trying to.

Portland’s defensive possessions average just 15.9 seconds, the 10th–shortest in Division I. BYU hoisted 63 field goal attempts and 12 free throws in a 95-67 win over the Pilots in Provo, Utah, two weeks ago. Portland gave up 70 and 30 to Gonzaga in a 116-88 home loss Jan. 9.

Portland won’t be able to slow down the Cougars here.BYU and OVER

Jacksonville at Bellarmine -7: What happens when a Division II power ascends to a lower-tier D-I conference? Well, look at Bellarmine.

The Knights, who won the 2011 Division II national title and made four Final Fours over the past decade, started the season 3-5 (although that included excusable losses to Duke and Notre Dame). They’re undefeated since and 5-1 ATS over that stretch. Bellarmine’s only pointspread loss came in the dreaded second game of a back-to-back on Saturday at Kennesaw State.

Although they’re ineligible for the NCAA Tournament in their first year at this level, the Knights are tied for first in the Atlantic Sun.

Bellarmine is not a defensive force, but that won’t be a killer against the Dolphins. And the Knights’ shooters (they’re 23rd nationally in KenPom’s effective field goal percentage) should have abig advantage against the Jacksonville defense. BELLARMINE

Last week: 1-1

Season: 21-8-4

If you enjoy betting on basketball, then you should be using a basketball betting site. More accurately, you should be using one of the best basketball sites.
This will ensure that you have an excellent, and safe, online betting experience, and get to benefit from all the advantages that the top sites have to offer.
We explain just what it is that makes them so good further down this page, but before we get to that we’ve listed what we consider to be the top sites at
this moment in time.

Basketball is a sport that could have been made just for betting. It’s such a high speed and high scoring sport, with regular changes in momentum, that betting on it is like riding a rollercoaster. You might be at the top of the world one minute, and throwing beer bottles at your TV the next.

Many people involved with basketball hate the fact that betting takes place on the sport. They worry about its potential for corrupting the game. They might have a point too. Cases such as the one of Tim Donaghy, a referee who was found to be betting on games that he officiated, certainly suggest so. However, basketball is simply too much fun to pass up on. The amount of betting action the sport attracts is testament to that.

It’s not just about the fun either, as betting on basketball offers the opportunity to make good money if you know what you’re doing. And of the first things you should be doing, even if you only bet for fun, is making sure that you use a quality and trustworthy betting site. That’s why we’ve made the recommendations above. If you’re looking for somewhere to place your basketball wagers, these are the places you should be joining.

You can find out more about exactly why we recommend these sites below. We’ve made some alternative recommendations too. There’s also some further information on basketball betting, and on the sport itself.

About Our Rankings

There are three main reasons why we recommend the sites listed at the top of this page. These are as follows.

• They are safe and secure
• They provide comprehensive coverage
• They offer a good slection of wagers

Let’s take a look at why each of these three reasons are so important.

Safety and Security

There are plenty of people who think that online betting is dangerous. The media in general doesn’t do a good job of covering online sports betting, so it’s not really surprising that people don’t know much about it. And people often think the worst about things they don’t really understand. If you’re one of these people, please allow us to address your concerns.

By using a legitimate betting site, your money will be just as safe as if you were betting with a reputable sportsbook in Nevada, or with any other well-known bookmaker. The top sites are perfectly reputable and trustworthy, and you have nothing to worry about when using them. But it is important that you use the right sites. There are some bad operators out there, with questionable reputation, and these must be avoided. And you will avoid them if you stick with the sites that we recommend.

We never recommend any gambling site of any type to our readers unless we are completely confident that they are safe and legit to use.

Basketball Sports Betting Model

Basketball Coverage

The sites we recommend cover the NBA, NCAA, and often some international leagues. This is important, because you want as many opportunities as possible to make some money. If you only have the option to bet on a handful of different games, then it’s much harder to find wagers with positive expected value. If you have the option to bet a wide variety of different games, then it becomes much easier.

Selection of Wagers

A good selection of wagers is important for the same reason as good coverage of basketball. You don’t just need to be able to bet a variety of different games, you also need plenty of options for how you bet on those games. If you can only place one or two different types of wager, your chances of making money will be limited. If you have the choice of many different types of wagers, your chances improve.

There are also several other factors we take into account when ranking these, or any, sites. Here are a few of the things we look for that are particularly relevant for sports betting sites.

• Multiple Deposit Options
• Fast Withdrawals
• Easy to Use
• Reputation & History
• Competitive Odds & Lines
• Good Customer Service

You can find out more about the ranking process we use in the article detailing how we compile our gambling site rankings.

Alternative Recommendations

We compile rankings of the best sports betting sites in several different categories, as we know that everyone has their own individual preferences and requirements. One site might be perfect for someone, but not right at all for someone else. The sites listed at the top of this page are most definitely ideal options if you want to bet on basketball, but there are some alternatives you might want to consider.

If you bet mostly from your mobile device, for example, then you might want to consider a site that is particularly good for mobile betting. We’ve ranked the best sites for mobile betting, and the majority of these cover basketball very well.

You might want to consider using a specialist live betting site too. Live, or in-play, betting is ideal for basketball. The fast pace of the game makes for an intense experience when betting on the action as it happens. The sites on the following page are the best options for live betting, and they all cover at least most basketball matches from the major leagues.

The final alternatives to consider are those that are good for a range of different sports. This won’t be relevant to you if you only bet on basketball, but if you do bet on other sports then there are some advantages of using the sites that we rank as the best sports betting sites overall.

How to Bet on Basketball

There are four main wagers that account for the majority of betting action on basketball. These are follows:

• Point Spreads
• Moneylines
• Totals
• Props

Point Spreads

Point spreads generally have very similar odds for both teams, but the favored team must win by a certain margin for a wager on them to be successful.
The underdog has to lose by no more than a certain margin for a wager on them to be successful. Here’s an example of a point spread that might be
offered by a bookmaker.

In this case, you’d need Miami to win by more than five points if betting on them. If betting on Portland, you’d need them to win or lose by less than five points. A bet on either team would be a push (tie), if Miami won by exactly five points. -110 are the odds for each wager, which means a $110 stake is required to win $100.

Moneylines

Moneyline wagers are simply bets on which team is going to win the game. The odds for a team will reflect their chances of winning. The favored teams have lower odds than the underdogs. Here’s how the moneyline might look for the match referenced above.

Totals

Totals are wagers on the total combined score of both teams. A basketball betting site will set a figure that they think will be close to the total score, and you then bet on whether the actual total score will be higher or lower than that figure. This is how the totals market might look for the match between Portland and Miami.

Totals are a very simple way to bet on basketball. This perhaps explains why they are so popular, even though it’s not particularly easy to make accurate
predictions regarding the total number of points scored.

Props

Prop bets are big in basketball. Some of the best basketball betting sites regularly host upwards of 100 different prop bets for a single game. Wagers of this type are typically on outcomes that are related to the game, but not necessarily related to the final outcome. Here are some examples.

This information is pretty much all you need to start betting on basketball, but there’s a lot more to learn if you want the best chance of making some money. We’re currently working on a comprehensive basketball betting guide for our website, and this will be an excellent resource for anyone wanting to improve their basketball betting skills.

• Basketball Betting for Beginners
• Handicapping Basketball Matches
• Simple Tips for Success
• Basketball Betting Options
• Basic & Advanced Strategies
• + Much More

March Madness Betting

There are several ways to bet on basketball, but arguably the most thrilling basketball betting scene goes down in March Madness. Basketball fans of all walks of life enjoy the excitement of the yearly college basketball tournament, which sets up an intense bracket to help decide each year’s college basketball national champion.

March Madness is most well known for fans filling out their brackets, as numerous websites offer printable and online brackets where fans can dissect and ultimately predict the outcome for each game. With While a perfect bracket is hard to come by, part of the fun can be correctly predicting early round upsets, while also seeing how many teams can last to the Final Four, or even the title game.

On top of the bracket challenge amongst friends, family and co-workers, March Madness also allows for one of the best basketball betting periods of the season. College basketball betting goes down all year, but March Madness opens the door to individual game betting, bracket betting, and long-term national champion bets.

College basketball’s most prestigious tourney has certainly been no stranger to serious betting action, with the amount of money being spent on March Madness betting growing by the year. The American Gaming Association (AGA) reported a whopping $9 billion in March Madness bets in 2015 and that number only grew ($9.2 billion) in 2016.

The current makeup of the March Madness tournament allows for 68 total teams, with four teams battling in the First Four to simply get into the tourney, and the rest of the teams battling it out in a single-elimination tournament to decide who gets to play for the title.

About the Sport of Basketball

The basketball betting guide mentioned above will also include a detailed section on the sport itself. This will be useful and interesting for anyone who wants to know more about basketball. Learning more about the sport is a good idea for betting purposes too, as solid basketball knowledge can only help when making betting decisions.

• About College Basketball
• NBA Teams Guides
• College Teams Guides
• Basketball Outside the US
• Legends of Basketball