March Madness betting continues on Thursday with the Sweet 16 round, and in this writeup we’ll look at the Syracuse/Butler matchup.  Butler getting a lot of love from the sports betting public–this game opened with Syracuse a -7 favorite, but the money has come in on the underdog.  The Orange is now a -6 favorite and my sources ‘in the know’ think that could go as low as -5′ or -5 by game time.  Syracuse won the Big East regular season title and finished with a 30-4 record overall.  They were bounced from the conference tournament by Georgetown, but that’s not surprising since they already had not only a NCAA tourney invite but a #1 seed all but secured.  Syracuse advanced to the Sweet 16 by mangling Vermont and Gonzaga by a combined 45 points.  Horizon Conference champs Butler are a #5 seed, and they got here by easily handling UTEP in the first round and outlasting a tough challenge from Murray State in the second.

MARCH MADNESS–SYRACUSE VS. BUTLER:

Syracuse not only had a great SU record this season but were monsters against the pointspread.  The Orange went 21-9 ATS overall, 5-1 ATS on neutral courts, 9-2 ATS in non-conference games and most impressively 22-4 SU/18-8 ATS against teams with winning records.  For such a ‘public’ team that was an underdog only three times this season those are some pretty impressive numbers.  A major factor of Syracuse’s success–both SU and ATS–is their field goal percentage.  They’re #1 in the country on 2 point baskets at 57.2%.

So why the love for Butler from the wagering public?  We’ve got nothing but respect for the Bulldogs, but this is a bad stylistic matchup for them.  They know that trying to run with Syracuse is suicidal, so they’ll try to slow the tempo and milk the clock.  That’s exactly what Gonzaga tried to do against the Orange, and all it got them was a 22 point beatdown.  The Bulldogs’ best case scenario is for their preferred tempo to throw the Orange out of sync and for them to start throwing up bricks.  The problem is that they’ve got a very versatile offense that can score from inside, outside and at 3 point range.  And hoping for a bad offensive game from a team with such a sick shooting percentage is almost as unlikely as hoping that a magic unicorn will appear at center court in Salt Lake City’s Energy Solutions Arena.  Playing at Salt Lake City’s altitude is never an easy task, but since neither team is used to it that’s a wash.  A slower tempo may even work to Syracuse’s advantage, since they’ll be able to conserve energy in the thin mountain air.

With the exception of the aforementioned bad shooting game by Syracuse, its difficult to see a scenario in which Butler can prevail.  They’re not an up tempo team, so playing an unfamiliar style against a team with superior athleticism isn’t going to work.  And given the Orange’s success against Gonzaga’s slowdown tactics its difficult to suggest that Butler will be able to get them out of sync even if they *can* dictate tempo.  Syracuse will be without their massive 6’9″ 260 pound forward Arinze Onuaku here, but that won’t be a huge liability against a team that doesn’t rely on a power inside game.  Besides, they’ve been without him in their first two tournament games and done just fine.  Butler is too fundamentally sound of a team to get blown out of the building like Vermont and Gonzaga, but by the same token its hard to see them getting within 10 points of Syracuse.  I’d hold fire on this game and see where the line is at tomorrow, but even at the current price Syracuse is our play.

PLAY SYRACUSE -6 OVER BUTLER