St. Peter’s has played Siena very tough recently, and even in a year where they are just 4-18, one of the Peacocks’ four wins this season has come vs. the Saints. Look for St. Peter’s to stick close again.
Expect a tight battle in Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference action Friday night when the St. Peter’s Peacocks (4-18 overall, 1-12 away) make the trip to upstate New York to take on the Siena Saints (10-11 overall, 8-3 home) at the Times Union Center in Albany, NY at 7:00 ET.
Yes, St. Peter’s is just 4-18, but the Peacocks have continued their uncanny knack of playing Siena tough as one of their four wins came vs. the Saints 51-44 in Jersey City on December 1. That marked the third straight win by St. Peter’s in this series and made it 6-1 against the NCAA Basketball odds in the last seven head-to-head meetings.
Siena has fallen off after winning a couple of NCAA Tournament games in recent years, as the Saints slipped to 13-18 overall last season and they are still one game under .500 overall this year while going just 5-6 inside the MAAC.
Neither of these teams has shot the ball particularly well, with Siena ranking 261st in the country in offensive efficiency and St. Peter’s ranking an even worse 320th in that same area, and the offensive deficiencies for both teams was fairly obvious in that first meeting in December, with the Peacocks shooting just 41.9 percent from the floor and the Saints shooting an abysmal 34.1 percent.
Well, very little has changed for these teams since that initial meeting, so in a game where each team should have trouble building a substantial lead, we recommend taking the generous points with St. Peter’s in this spot.
The point spread at Pinnacle Sports has St. Peter’s as a nice +8 underdog for this contest at current odds of -111.
Yes, Siena has had a couple of nice wins lately, most notably a huge upset of Iona as a 10½-point underdog, but it appears that has made the Saints a tad overvalued at the current time. After all, this is still a team that ranks only 202nd in the country in two-point shooting at 47.0 percent and 314th in three-point shooting at a hideous 29.7 percent. For good measure, the Saints also rank 248th in free throw shooting at 66.4 percent and they rank 223rd in turnover percentage.
In short, this is not an offense that can be trusted giving this many points. Indeed, while Siena is 8-3 straight up at home this season, its average winning margin in upstate New York has been only +2.9 points.
Now we get that St. Peter’s is 1-12 on the road, but the Peacocks are a more respectable 6-6 against the spread in those games. Remember also that St. Peter’s did win in this building 67-57 last season, and although the Peacocks enter this game on a four-game losing streak, all four of those losses came vs. teams ranked higher than Siena, which ranks only 212th overall on the Pomeroy Ratings.
We really do not think these teams are separated by all that much, so take the point in Friday night MAAC play.
NCAA Basketball Pick: St. Peter’s +8 (-111)