Free Pick | NCAA | Tuesday | Nov. 5

Nelly’s Basketball has had 7 winning college seasons in a row – we also had a huge 61% NBA regular season last season!

#604 North Texas -13 over Evansville 7:00 PM CT

Replacing Grant McCasland’s successful stint at North Texas was a challenge but Ross Hodge had a decent first season leading the Mean Green last season and he has been with the program since 2017 and has maintained many of the principles McCasland had. North Texas went 19-15 last season featuring excellent defensive numbers and good outside shooting. The slow pace of play scares away many on the Mean Green as a favorite but 15 of 19 wins last season came by at least 10 points as the defense can dominate, 14 times last season holding opponents to 60 or fewer points. Evansville is in the third season under David Ragland, making a big jump of improvement from 5-27 to 17-18 last season. Most of the wins, however, came early in the season in one of the nation’s weakest non-conference schedules, producing seven non-conference wins outside the nation’s top 250. The Aces went just 6-14 in MVC play and Yacine Toumi and Ben Humirchous transferred to major conference teams while Kenny Strawbridge and Antonio Thomas graduated as Ragland must replace four starters from last season. North Texas was hit by significant transfer losses as well, but the Mean Green replenished the roster with several quality additions, including Atin Wright, who had a 26-point game in one of three wins vs. Evansville last season while playing for Drake. Latrell Josell was also the best player on a solid Stephen F. Austin team. Role players from Cal, FAU, and Creighton also join the mix as this is a talented group with good size and experience falling to a proven winning system. Last season Evansville played five road games vs. top 100 teams going 0-5 with an average margin of defeat of 32 points.