College of Charleston vs Chattanooga 11/7/22 College Basketball Picks, Predictions, Odds

The Chattanooga Mocs and the Charleston Cougars meet in college basketball action from the TD Arena on Monday.

The Chattanooga Mocs will look to build on a solid 2021-22 season, finishing at 27-8 with a 14-4 mark in SoCon play. The Mocs finished as the regular season champions in the SoCon and as the top seed in the SoCon tournament, the Mocs took out the Citadel, Wofford and Furman on the way to the SoCon tournament title and the SoCon’s bid to the NCAA tournament. The Mocs almost pulled off the upset in the first round but fell short by a point against Illinois. The Mocs lose their top three players from last year, including Malachi Smith (19.9 PPG, 6.7 RPG, 3 APG), David Jean-Baptiste (14.3 PPG) and Silvio De Sousa (11 PPG, 6.9 RPG) but at least get a couple of replacement reinforcements in double-double machine Jake Stephens who averaged 19.6 PPG and 9 RPG for VMI as well as fellow VMI transfer Honor Huff, who put up 10 PPG last season for the Keydets. Only time will tell if the Mocs can retool and reload.

The Charleston Cougars will hope to build on year two under Pat Kelsey, finishing 2021-22 at 17-15 overall, including 8-10 in CAA conference play. The Cougars upset Hofstra in the CAA tournament quarterfinals before falling to UNC-Wilmington in the semis, ending their season. The Cougars lose three double-digit scorers from last year’s squad, including John Meeks (14.1 PPG, 4.7 RPG), Dimitrius Underwood (11.5 PPG, 6.7 RPG, 3.6 APG) and Brenden Tucker (11.3 PPG) but did well to reload, and it starts with a pair of double-digit machines in NAIA All-American Jaylon Scott who had 19.2 PPG, 11.6 RPG and 5.7 APG for Bethel while Ante Brzovic comes in from D-II Southeast Oklahoma State who had 17.6 PPG and 11 RPG last season. Reyne Smith also returns after logging 12.1 PPG last season. The pieces are there for Charleston to contend but it’s going to be interesting to see how long it takes these new pieces to gel as a unit.

Chattanooga is 6-2 ATS in their last 8 Monday games and 36-16 ATS in their last 52 road games while the under is 4-1 in their last 5 games overall. Charleston is 6-1 ATS in their last 7 games overall and 3-7 ATS in their last 10 home games while the over is 6-1 in their last 7 games overall.

I’m loving the under in this game. There’s a lot of turnover from both sides happening here, but I think this is going to be a bit more of a defensive battle than this line would suggest. A. I think there’s going to be a feeling out process early on that’ll reduce some scoring, and B. this is the kind of game Chattanooga likes to play with a solid defensive philosophy and Charleston doesn’t play a ton of high-scoring games as it is. Give me the under in a 72-69 kind of game.