Tournament Picks: Texas vs Abilene Christian 3/20/21 College Basketball Picks, Odds, Predictions

The Texas Longhorns battle the Abilene Christian Wildcats in an NCAA tournament first-round matchup in March Madness college basketball action from Lucas Oil Stadium on Saturday night.

The Abilene Christian Wildcats come into this game representing the Southland Conference after finishing the year with a 13-2 conference mark as part of their 23-4 overall mark this season. The Wildcats took down Lamar and routed Nicholls on the way to claiming the Southland conference tournament title and their spot in the Big Dance. Kolton Kohl leads the Wildcats in scoring with 12.3 PPG along with 4.8 RPG while Joe Pleasant has 10.8 PPG with a team-high 5.4 RPG to lead the Wildcats on the glass. Coryon Mason has 10.8 PPG to make up the trio of double-digit scorers for Abilene Christian up to this point in the year while Reggie Miller leads the Wildcats in the assist department with 4.4 APG this season. As a team, Abilene Christian is averaging 77 PPG on 45.7% shooting from the field and 34.5% from three while allowing 60.7 PPG on 40% shooting from the field and 31% from three this season.

The Texas Longhorns come into the conference tournament representing the Big 12 as the conference tournament champion for the first time in the history of the program. The tournament berth marks Texas’ 35th trip to the Big Dance, the most of any team in the field this season. The Longhorns upended Texas Tech in the quarterfinals before an unexpected bye in the semis thanks to a positive COVID test from Kansas. The Longhorns would then beat Oklahoma State in the conference title game to hoist the Big 12 trophy for the first time. Andrew Jones leads the Longhorns in scoring with 15.4 PPG along with 5 RPG while Courtney Ramey has 14.1 PPG with 3.9 APG and Matt Coleman III has 13 PPG with 3.9 RPG and a team-high 4.2 APG to lead the Longhorns in the assist department. Freshman Greg Brown added 10.9 PPG and a team-high 7.4 RPG this season to lead Texas on the glass and to cap off the group of double-digit scorers for Texas this season. As a team, Texas is averaging 74.9 PPG on 45.3% shooting from the field and 35.3% from three while allowing 68.2 PPG on 40.5% shooting from the field and 32.1% from three this season.

Abilene Christian is 4-0 ATS in their last 4 games overall and 5-0 ATS in their last 5 neutral site games while the over is 10-1 in their last 11 games following a win. Texas is 5-0 ATS in their last 5 games overall and 0-9 ATS in their last 9 NCAA tournament games while the over is 14-5 in their last 19 games overall.

I get the allure of Texas laying the points because Shaka Smart loves to coach in March and his guys will get up for this one. However, Abilene Christian’s playing with house money right now as they really have nothing to lose coming into this one, and those teams are the most dangerous in this tournament. This is also an ACU team with an offense that’s just outside of the top-50 in scoring and are top-10 in scoring defense. This is going to be a defensive war and if it is, I want the points in my pocket.