Inside Big East Basketball

Inside Big East Basketball

In this article, we'll take a look at trends that have developed in Big East Conference play over the past five years. Just as we did with Inside ACC Basketball we'll look at the past five years worth of results, beginning with the 2006-07 season through the 2010-11 season, both against the spread and in relation to totals.

The Big East Conference

The Big East Conference has several noticable trends at a quick glance. All favorites are 357-330-13 against the spread during the five-year research period, while totals were 320-374-6, making a decent tendency to go under the total.

If we look at the tendency of favorites to cover the spread, we'd see that home favorites are a 50-50 proposition, going 238-239-4, while road favorites have covered at a solid 119-91-4 (56.7%) clip.

Point Spread Breakdown

Now we'll look at home and away favorites in various spread groupings:
Home favorites of 2.5 points or less: 33-32-1
Home favorites of 3 to 5.5 points: 63-69-3
Home favorites of 6 to 9.5 points: 64-56-1
Home favorites of 10 to 14.5 points: 58-53-2
Home favorites of 15 to 20 points: 21-27-2
Home favorites of 20.5 or more points: 1-4-0

As expected by the overall 50-50 performance of home favorites, there is little that we can point to here, with the possible exception of the large favorites, meaning those of 15 points or greater, which were just 22-31-2 ATS during the study.

Moving on to our road favorites:
Road favorites of 2.5 points or less: 35-26-2
Road favorites of 3 to 5.5 points: 33-28-1
Road favorites of 6 to 9.5 points: 33-23-1
Road favorites of 10 to 14.5 points: 16-12-1
Road favorites of 15 to 20 points: 2-2-0

I would have expected there to be one or two groupings that saw a higher winning percentage, but for the most part, road favorites in the Big East have been decent wagers almost across the board.

Totals Breakdown

124.5 or fewer points: 15-19-0
125 to 129.5 points: 50-44-0
130 to 134.5 points: 50-74-2
135 to 139.5 points: 65-65-2
140 to 144.5 points: 45-72-1
145 to 149.5 points: 40-53-1
150 to 154.5 points: 31-24-0
155 to 159.5 points: 20-17
160 or more points: 4-6

This is somewhat as we expected, considering that Big East games go under the total 53.9% of the time. Games have gone under the total most often in the 130 to 134.5 and 140 to 144.5 ranges, but it's difficult to lose for games in those two ranges and decide to exclude the 135 to 139.5 range, even though they are 50-50.

The easiest thing to do would be to look for games to go under the total, with the exception of those predicted to be high-scoring shootouts, which would be those with a total of 150 or over. That one filter alone would change the results to 265-327-6, which is a decent 55.2% of the games going under the total.

From the standpoint of "Does it make sense?" which is the one question that should be asked when you look at any system or trend, you could also make a case for excluding the games expected to be defensive struggles, meaning those with a total of 129.5 or lower, which would leave you with a 56.9% winning percentage and a 200-264-6 record.

Based on our findings, in the Big East Conference, road favorites and the unders should always get a second look.