Cleveland State vs Northern Kentucky 12/2/21 College Basketball Picks, Predictions, Odds

The Northern Kentucky Norse and the Cleveland State Vikings meet in Horizon League college basketball action from the Wolstein Center on Thursday night.

The Northern Kentucky Norse will be out to bounce back from a 77-68 loss at the hands of DePaul in their last game. Trevon Faulkner leads the Norse in scoring with 13.4 PPG while Hubertas Pivorius has 10.6 PPG as the only other double-digit scorer for Northern Kentucky so far this season. Marques Warrick has 9.6 PPG while Sam Vinson has 8.8 PPG with a team-high 4 APG and Adrian Nelson’s got 8.6 PPG to match his team-high 8.6 RPG as well this season. As a team, Northern Kentucky is averaging 72 PPG on 41.3% shooting from the field, 39.5% from three and 71% from the foul line while allowing 68.6 PPG on 44.5% shooting from the field and 36% from three this season.

The Cleveland State Vikings will try to add to an 89-47 win over Penn St.-Behrend in their last game. D’Moi Hodge leads the Vikings in scoring with 12.3 PPG while Torrey Paton is right behind with 12.2 PPG and a team-high 6.6 RPG as the Vikings’ top rebounder in addition to 2.6 APG to make up the pair of double-digit scorers for Cleveland State so far this season. Broc Finstuen has 8.3 PPG and Deshon Parker also has 2.8 APG to lead the Vikings in assists this season. As a team, Cleveland State’s averaging 70.7 PPG on 45% shooting from the field, 31% from three and 65.3% from the foul line while allowing 62.7 PPG on 38.6% shooting from the field and 31.4% from three this season.

Northern Kentucky is 0-5 ATS in their last 5 games overall and 2-5-1 ATS in their last 8 road games against a team with a winning home record while the over is 7-2 in their last 9 road games. Cleveland State is 19-9-1 ATS in their last 29 games overall and 11-5-1 ATS in their last 17 home games while the over is 6-1 in their last 7 games against a team with a winning percentage above .600.

I get the allure of points with the Norse, but Northern Kentucky’s done nothing to show that they’re capable of covering this kind of number even early on this season. Cleveland State’s been better than I expected early on this year and given the small sample size across the board, I’ve gotta go with the Vikings here.