Stanford vs Duke Prediction 1/17/26 College Basketball Picks Today

The Duke Blue Devils and the Stanford Cardinal meet Saturday in college basketball action from Maples Pavilion. Here’s a Stanford vs Duke prediction. We will look at this from a betting perspective and determine the best Stanford vs Duke pick.

Duke Blue Devils Betting Preview

Duke opened up the season with a string of wins over Texas, Western Carolina, Army, Indiana State, Kansas, Niagara, Howard, Arkansas, Florida, Michigan State and Lipscomb. Following their first loss of the season versus Texas Tech, the Blue Devils came back with wins over Georgia Tech, Florida State, Louisville and SMU in the next four outings. Over the first 16 games of the year that would give Duke a 15-1 record in the books.

Matched up against Cal on Wednesday the Blue Devils jumped out to a 37-30 halftime edge. Duke closed with a 34-26 advantage from there, eventually pulling off a nice road win 71-56. Leading the scoring was Cameron Boozer with 21 points and 13 rebounds, while Isaiah Evans had 17 points in 30 minutes. Nikolas Khamenia added 10 points and four rebounds in 25 minutes during the victory effort for the Blue Devils as well.

Stanford Cardinal Betting Preview

Over on the Stanford side, they managed to win 11 of their first 13 games this year. The wins in that time were over Portland State, Montana, Montana State, Louisiana, Minnesota, Saint Louis, Portland, San Jose State, Texas-Arlington, Colorado and Cal State Northridge. After that came a 2-2 stretch in four games with losses to Notre Dame and Virginia among wins over Louisville and Virginia Tech. That would make for a 13-4 run across the first 17 outings.

In the North Carolina game on Wednesday the Cardinal held a 47-45 deficit at the break. Stanford got it going in the second half on a 50-43 run and took the eventual victory 95-90 in the end. Ebuka Okorie was the top team scorer with 36 points, nine assists and three rebounds. Both Ryan Agarwal (six rebounds) and Jeremy Dent-Smith (one assist) added 20 points apiece.

Why the Stanford Cardinal will win

• Stanford has won each of its last six day games against AP-ranked opponents at Maples Pavilion.
• Stanford has won the first half in 14 of its last 17 day games at Maples Pavilion.

Why the Duke Blue Devils will win

• Duke has won each of its last 22 games against non-AP-ranked opponents.
• Stanford has lost 22 of its last 25 games against Top 10 AP-ranked opponents.
• Duke has won the first half in 18 of its last 19 Saturday games as a top-15 AP-ranked team against a non-AP-ranked team.

Stanford vs Duke Prediction

I’ll take a stab on Stanford here. The Cardinal are coming off a nice win over a good North Carolina team at Maples Pavilion this week. In that one Stanford shot a great 57.1 percent from both the field and from 3-point range (16-of-28) alongside just eight turnovers. The Cardinal did get out-rebounded 29-22 and outscored 38-28 in the paint along with a few missed free throws (15-of-23 for 65.2 percent), though. The 58.2 percent shooting allowed on defense didn’t help matters either. Still, the Cardinal have gone 3-1 in the last five outings, with the lone defeat being on the road versus Virginia. Saturday’s game will be another tough one, but playing at home will certainly help.

As for Duke, they didn’t have a ton of trouble with Cal in their latest road win at Haas Pavilion. The Blue Devils shot a solid 45.2 percent from the field in that one with a 38-22 rebounding edge and a 42-16 advantage in the paint. That said, Duke was pretty rough from outside (7-of-32 for 21.9 percent) and the line (8-of-17 for 47.1 percent). That makes five wins in a row for the Blue Devils, with three of those coming on the road. Duke has scored 71 or more points in seven straight games as well.