NCAAB odds, pick: Memphis vs. Temple for Thursday, Feb. 8

Memphis vs. Temple Odds

Thursday, Feb 8, 7 p.m. ET (ESPN2)

Odds via DraftKings. Get up-to-the-minute NCAAB odds here.

Memphis Tigers

Memphis was likely overvalued at 15-2, having gone 8-1 in games decided by five or fewer points in that stretch. Bart Torvik's T-Rank metric considered the 15-2 Tigers the 77th-best team in the nation at the time.

We should not, however, underreact to Memphis' recent rough patch. A four-game losing streak was ended by the Tigers' recent home win over Wichita State, but that game was no cure-all. Memphis trailed by 11 points with under six minutes to play and escaped with an unlikely victory, clearly not having shaken its demons. In that five-game period, T-Rank says Memphis' play dropped off in a major way, playing the like 184th-ranked team over that span.

What happened to this promising team?

Some of it can be explained by an injury. Memphis lost guard Caleb Mills to a knee injury that is believed to be season-ending. He wasn't having his best season (that's inexplicably still his freshman year, four years and two schools ago), but Mills was a catalyst on both ends of the floor and a veteran leader for the Tigers. Without him, Memphis has been adrift. Even the first three games he missed, all Memphis wins, showed signs of issues. Memphis trailed SMU by 15 points early and scored just 0.87 points per possession before winning by three. The Tigers needed overtime to defeat a very suspect UTSA team, and coasted to win at Wichita State thanks to 63% 3-point shooting and despite allowing 1.2 points per possession from a bad Shockers offense.

Perhaps the worst thing you find digging into the stats from the Tigers' last five outings is signs of sloppiness and malaise. Over that nearly three-week span, Memphis ranks in the bottom 30 in the nation in turnover rate, defensive rebounding rate, free-throw rate allowed and 3-point rate allowed. A team that is careless with the ball, doesn't box out, fouls too much and gives up open looks is no team to trust. All of those traits creeping in for a team laden with seniors — ranking 57th in the country in D1 playing experience, per KenPom — makes matters even worse.

Temple Owls

If there's a team in the AAC you'd like to see in an attempt to get back on track, it might be these Owls. Under first-year head coach Adam Fisher, the Owls started off the season 6-3, showing some potential promise. Since then, the wheels have fallen off.

Temple has lost nine of its last 11 games, posting a 1-8 record in the month of January. Temple is tied for last place in the conference and is coming off two heart-breaking road overtime defeats.

The Owls' defense isn't great, yet it is light-years ahead of a slugging, plodding offense that doesn't seem to have any answers. Temple is shooting just 37.8% from the field this season, third worst in the entire sport. The Owls are bad from outside the arc (just 29.6% this season) and even worse inside the arc (43.7%, bottom 15 nationally). Temple doesn't have any "easy button" answers, even ranking second-to-last in the conference in earning trips to the free-throw line.

Hysier Miller carries the load offensively, leading the team in scoring and assists, though he does so incredibly inefficiently. Miller is the only player in the entirety of men's college basketball scoring under 16 points per game while attempting more than 16 field goals per game. There's no real other option, but you have to think something would work better than what we saw in a recent three-game span in which Miller shot 6-of-35 (including 0-of-20 from 3, half of which came in one game!) for just 21 total points in three Temple losses.

Memphis vs. Temple

Betting Pick & Prediction

It's not the sexiest matchup — a team in absolute freefall versus a team already at rock bottom. At this point in either of these team's seasons, I wouldn't feel comfortable betting Monopoly money on them to win or cover.

I'll instead peek at the total, which is much more appealing in this case. Temple is a bad shooting team, but even by its own standards has been icy cold. The Owls have made better than 26% from long range in just two of their last seven games and are shooting under 29% from deep in that time.

Memphis wants to play a back-and-forth, up-tempo game, and Temple — in an effort to find some way to create buckets — will likely oblige.

Pick: Over 148