On Saturday, Tennessee basketball massively underachieved expectations. They were No. 5 in both polls and double-digit favorites at home over an unranked and reeling Kentucky Wildcats team.
With Chris Lofton’s jersey being retired, it was a game meant for them to dominate. Instead, they had the perfect storm of an awful shooting performance, erratic guard play and lack of effort on the boards to lose 63-56.
In reality, Tennessee basketball just forgot it was playing Kentucky. Now, the Vols are on the road for a quick turnaround, and they have to face the Mississippi State Bulldogs on the road.
This is a rematch of a Jan. 3 matchup, one UT won 87-53 at home. After constantly overreacting to different swings by Rick Barnes’ team, FanDuel seemed to get it right by staying high on the Vols last Saturday despite them struggling with the Vanderbilt Commodores last week.
However, what’s clear is that the oddsmakers were just overreacting to Kentucky’s struggles and completely forgot about the talent on that team. That’s evidenced by the line for this game.
Because of that loss, FanDuel has Tennessee as a 5.5-point favorite, ridiculously low for a team that beat this same foe by 34 last time. Sure, it’s now on the road in a night game, but does that make this much of a difference?
The over/under for the game is set at 122.5, and the moneyline is Mississippi State +205 and Tennessee -255. Taking all of that into account, it’s hard to see the Vols not covering.
Look, Mississippi State has lost five of its last six. The program is reeling, and Tennessee basketball isn’t going to help with that, so take Tennessee -5.5 in this one. As for the scoring, the Vols just dropped 87 on them. They had one off-game Saturday. That won’t happen on a Tuesday night.
As a result, Rocky Top will score enough for this game to hit the Over 122.5. The score won’t be as much of a blowout as the last game was, but the Vols will put up enough to hit that mark. Think something in the range of 70-55 in this one.
