This article is part of our College Basketball Picks series.
Big Ten and Pac-12 conference games fill the Wednesday college basketball slate. Steve Peralta examines some select matchups and offers up his best bets of the evening.
Michigan at 
Iowa
Michigan has played an up-and-down season so far, but nonetheless, it has still proven to be a capable team. The Wolverines already have wins over Pittsburgh, Maryland and Penn State, while almost all of their losses have been close and come against teams with legitimate tournament aspirations. The one truly awful performance came against Central Michigan around the holidays, a shocking home loss for sure, but the Wolverines bounced back in dominant fashion over their next two games. Overall, the Wolverines are trending upward, having covered the spread in six of nine games since the end of November. Michigan has been stronger on offense for most of the season, but lately, it's the defensive play that's most noteworthy. Through four conference games, Michigan has the best defensive efficiency rating among all Big Ten teams, and it's holding opponents to 44 percent on two-point field goal attempts, also the best in the conference. This is in stark contrast to Thursday's opponent.
Much like Michigan, Iowa has also played inconsistently throughout the season and hit rock bottom not too long ago when it dropped a home game to Eastern Illinois. The Hawkeyes followed up that dreadful performance with back-to-back Big Ten road losses before winning its two most recent games. Coming off a big victory at Rutgers, Iowa appears to be back on the rise, but its underlying stats still leave me skeptical. Through five conference games, Iowa has the fourth-worst defensive efficiency among Big Ten teams, and it's allowing opponents to make over 52 percent of two-point field goal attempts, the second-highest percentage allowed in the conference. Michigan currently has the fourth-highest offensive efficiency rating in the Big Ten during conference play, so it's likely to take advantage of Iowa's soft defense.
It's hard to know which Iowa team will show up on Thursday, the one that defeated Iowa State earlier in the season, or the one that lost to Eastern Illinois just a few weeks ago. Either way, Michigan has enough talent and skills to steal a road win in this matchup. The Wolverines rank higher than Iowa in efficiency on both ends of the court during conference play, so it appears they might have the upper hand. I'll take the points in this matchup.
College Basketball Best Bet: Michigan +4
Arizona State at 
Oregon
Arizona State already has some impressive wins on its resume, but unfortunately, it has some brutal losses as well. Its lowest moments have come on the road -- the first one happening on November 13 when it traveled to Texas Southern. The Sun Devils fell in overtime, losing to a team that has beaten just one other D1 team all season. While losing to a team like Texas Southern is bad enough, a month later, Arizona State traveled to San Francisco and completely no-showed, losing 97-60. It's not unusual for a college basketball team to have a few bad outings during a season, but good teams don't typically have extremely bad losses on multiple occasions. We're about to find out a lot more about Arizona State as it goes through conference season, but at this point, there's good reason to have some doubts.
Oregon enters Thursday's game with a 9-7 record, but the loss column is a bit deceiving. Oregon has played the ninth-most difficult schedule in the country, per KenPom, so it would normally have fewer losses if it didn't have the likes of Houston, UConn and Michigan State on its non-conference schedule. Aside from those opponents, Oregon also played and defeated quality teams in the form of Villanova, Washington State and Nevada. More recently, Oregon just played its best game of the season, beating a formidable Utah team by double-digits in Salt Lake City. Ultimately, the key to this team is head coach Dana Altman, who has led the Ducks to a winning conference record in each of the last 11 seasons. This year's team already has three conference wins under its belt, on its way to extending the streak.
Until proven otherwise, it's hard to trust Arizona State on the road, especially after how it played in its most recent trip to San Francisco. Oregon, on the other hand, has a long and successful track record under Coach Altman, so the Ducks will no doubt be ready. I'm on the home team in this one.
College Basketball Best Bet: Oregon -4
Stanford at 
Washington
Stanford's stock is plummeting, and I'm not sure when it will hit bottom. Earlier in the year, it seemed that the Cardinal simply had a schedule that was far too challenging. That's still somewhat true, as it ranks No. 20 in difficulty (per KenPom), but the team hasn't had the same fight in its last two games. Stanford nearly defeated Colorado two weeks ago on Dec. 29, but then didn't bring the same energy against Utah a couple of days later. Then, a week later on Jan. 6, Stanford turned in its worst performance of the season, a 22-point loss to Cal. Not only was the point differential bad, but Stanford allowed 92 points to a Cal team that hadn't scored more than 80 points all season before that game. Cal has the second-worst offensive adjusted efficiency rating among Pac-12 teams (per KenPom), so the fact that Stanford allowed this kind of output is concerning, to say the least. The more alarming stat is that this problem isn't just a one-game fluke. Through five conference games, Stanford has the worst defensive efficiency among all Pac-12 teams, also ranking last in effective field goal percentage allowed, two-point field goal percentage allowed and three-point field goal percentage allowed.
Washington is also on a downward turn, now on a five-game skid, but it's worth noting the Huskies just finished going through a five-game gauntlet of high-quality opponents. Washington recently hosted Auburn, the two Southern California teams and then traveled to play the two Arizona schools. It's hard to draft a more difficult stretch of five games if you play in the Pac-12. In any event, although Washington lost all five games, it showed tremendous fight at Arizona. The Huskies jumped out to a 38-24 lead but eventually ran out of gas before it lost by three points. Nobody cares about morale victories, but at the same time, this game against Arizona wasn't necessarily a lucky occurrence. Washington showed flashes of playing great basketball earlier in the season as well. The Huskies defeated Saint Mary's on Thanksgiving and then also defeated Colorado in early December, two opponents that have accomplished significantly more than Stanford.
Overall, both teams are desperate for a win, but only one of them has proven themselves capable of defeating a quality opponent. Stanford has had nine opportunities to earn a quality win this season, per KenPom, and it's lost all nine, eight of them by at least four points, and four of them by double-digits. Washington, meanwhile, has already beaten multiple good teams, as noted earlier. I'm taking the Huskies in this matchup.
College Basketball Best Bet: Washington -2.5
Thursday College Basketball Best Bets:
Here's a recap of my best college basketball bets for Thursday:
- Michigan +4
- Oregon -4
- Washington -2.5
For up-to-date information on the latest college basketball odds and props from multiple sportsbooks, check out the College Basketball odds page on RotoWire.
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