The Louisville Cardinals (13-5, 8-4 ACC) host the No. 20 Virginia Cavaliers (16-6, 12-4) Saturday at 4 p.m. ET in KFC Yum! Center. Below, we analyze the Virginia-Louisville odds and lines, with NCAA college basketball picks and predictions.
Rankings courtesy of the Ferris Mowers Coaches Poll powered by USA TODAY Sports.
Virginia at Louisville: Odds, spread and lines
Odds via BetMGM; access USA TODAY Sports’ betting odds for a full list. Lines last updated at 8:25 a.m. ET.
- Money line: Virginia -140 (bet $140 to win $100) | Louisville +115 (bet $100 to win $115)
- Against the spread/ATS: Virginia -2.5 (-105) | Louisville +2.5 (-115)
- Over/Under: 121.5 (O: -110 | U: -110)
Virginia at Louisville: Three things to know
- Virginia is limping down the stretch. The Cavaliers snapped a 3-game losing skid by beating Miami 62-51 as a 15-point home favorite Monday but lost ATS for a fourth straight contest.
- Louisville has its last two games, including a double-digit beatdown of Notre Dame as a 4-point home favorite Feb. 23 and an impressive 80-73 overtime win at Duke as a 5-point underdog Feb. 27.
- The Cavaliers have beaten the Cardinals in nine of their last 10 meetings, but Louisville has covered two of the last three. However, both of the Cardinals’ leading scorers from last season are no longer with the program.
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Virginia at Louisville: Odds, lines, predictions and picks
Prediction
Virginia 63, Louisville 55
Money line (ML)
PASS with a lean on Virginia (-140), but I’d prefer to lay the points and save the extra 30 cents on the dollar it would cost to bet the Cavaliers straight-up.
However, if more money comes in on the Cardinals and brings the Cavaliers down to -125 favorites or lower, then I’d take Virginia’s money line.
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Against the spread (ATS)
It’s been profitable backing Virginia when it’s laying points on the road.
The Cavaliers are 15-5-3 ATS as a road favorite with a plus-3.8-point ATS margin since the beginning of 2018 while Louisville is 2-3 ATS with a minus-6.6-point margin and a minus-2.5-point ATS margin over that span.
Also, even though Louisville has a pretty good 3-point defense (33rd in opponent’s 3-point percentage), the Cardinals are ranked 290th in opponent’s 3-point attempts per game.
That’s not going to cut it against a Virginia team that’s 15th in Ken Pom’s adjusted offensive efficiency and has the 2nd-highest 3-point percentage in the country.
BET 1 unit on VIRGINIA -2.5 (-105).
Over/Under (O/U)
Both teams play at a painfully slow tempo. In fact, Virginia has the slowest charted pace of play in the nation out of 347 teams while Louisville ranks 299th in pace.
Furthermore, Louisville has a better per-game rebounding margin so it’ll be able to minimize second-chance points from Virginia as well as run its own snail-paced offensive sets.
BET UNDER 121.5 (-110) for a quarter-unit.
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