5 Best NCAA Tournament Predictions Against The Spread: First Round Saturday

What 5 NCAA Tournament games appear to be the best bets and the best picks against the spread going into first round on Saturday?

2. (2) Alabama vs (15) Iona

LINEAlabama -17
ATS PICK: Alabama
Bet on this, BetMGM latest line

History and all, Rick Pitino is a basketball coaching genius.

You NASCAR this and make everything uniform and even in this tournament talent-wise, take Pitino and take your chances.

But he doesn’t have the talent on his Gaels, and he’s been able to maximize everything he can out of this team.

Iona had the longest breaks of anyone in the tournament, missing the a few weeks at the end of February and early March before winning the MAAC Tournament, and that’s after missing all of January and the first part of February. The legs are going to be there after playing just 17 games, and …

Seton Hall 86, Iona 64. It was all the way back in late November, but that’s the one brand-name team the Gaels played, and they got rocked in the second half.

And that’s sort of what’s about to happen here.

They’ll keep up with Bama, and Twitter will put them in the Final Four after seven minutes, they don’t shoot threes and Alabama will keep firing away.

The Tide will go on the run that Iona won’t have the ability to do.

The 17 Bama is giving away might seem like a lot, but they’ve won nine times this year by that many or more. They’ll pull away late.

Speaking of plucky teams from New York …

NEXT: LSU vs St. Bonaventure