Why oddsmakers may dislike the Big East
In Las Vegas, they say the house always wins. That probably isn't the case when it comes to Big East basketball this season.
There were eight games involving Big East teams over the weekend, writes Pat Forde of ESPN.com (http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=forde_pat&id=3219660&sportCat=ncb). Underdogs won half of them and covered the spread in three of the others.
While the league appears to lack a dominant team, it's clear that no team can take a night off. After starting the conference season 0-6, Rutgers knocked off a pair of ranked teams in Villanova (http://www.philly.com/inquirer/sports/20080124_Rutgers_shocks_Nova.html) and Pittsburgh (http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08026/852629-175.stm). Both the Wildcats and the Panthers probably were counting on a breather.
Between the top and bottom, there are 11 teams with either three or four league losses.
"It's the toughest league in the history of college basketball....It's going to be a jumbled mess at the end in the middle," said Cincinnati coach Mick Cronin.. "But there are a lot of teams good enough to go in [the NCAA Tournament] -- maybe 12. The question is whether we'll ever get nine or 10 in."(http://blogs.jsonline.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=89644)
http://blogs.jsonline.com/muhoops/archive/2008/01/30/why-oddsmakers-may-dislike-the-big-east.aspx