Free Pick | NCAA | Saturday | March 18

Nelly’s Basketball is off to a 5-2 start in the NCAA Tournament – check out our evening 2-for-1 offer for Saturday. Don’t miss an early NBA selection as well as we are on a 13-2 NBA run!

Free Pick Saturday: #809 Arkansas +4 over Kansas 4:15 PM CT

The seeding presents a perception of a significant gap between Arkansas and Kansas but Arkansas was an Elite 8 team last season that underachieved in SEC play this season. The Razorbacks faced one of the most difficult paths in a very good and deep conference and had a few missteps. This squad did beat Missouri, Texas A&M, Kentucky, and Auburn, and had nine single-digit losses on the season. Arkansas had a rather dominant performance in the Round of 64, leading by 17 at one-point in an eventual 10-point win over Illinois, even while having a mediocre shooting game. The Razorbacks grade as a top 15 defense nationally and could be a serious threat to unseat the defending national champions, at a low-price that will keep most casual observers going with the Jayhawks in the market. Kansas is a deserving #1 seed based on a 16-1 start to the season though some of those wins didn’t pan out to be as meaningful as they once looked. Duke was shorthanded and early in a major transition for the five-point Kansas win in Indianapolis, while the overtime win over Wisconsin in the Bahamas was an incredibly fortunate and undeserved result. Since mid-January Kansas is 12-6 and nearly half of those wins were single-digit results. The win over Howard Thursday featured the Jayhawks being tested early despite the lopsided final and it seems likely that Bill Self may not be present for this game and even if he does arrive it has been a situation that likely has disrupted the normal preparation routine. Norm Roberts kept the key players for Kansas in nearly the entire game despite the lopsided margin to negate the edge the #1 seed often has in the opening round. This is a favorable Des Moines venue for the Jayhawks but ultimately as this line suggests, this looks much more like a 3/6 pairing than a 1/8 pairing and the underdog has a great deal of appeal given the size of Arkansas and the pressure and pace the Razorbacks are capable of putting on a Kansas squad that has not resembled last year’s team offensively this season.

Big E Basketball missed his last 20* but went 4-1 Friday and is 8-3 the past four days while + over 220* this season. Don’t miss his daytime 20* for his Best Bet of the Round of 32!

Bobby Dalton went 4-1 on Friday for a big day and is on a 45-31 all basketball run the past 30 days!