We rate each pick 1 to 5 units with 5 being the strongest play (read about units).
Risk 1% of your bankroll per unit (never risk more than 5% of total bankroll on any pick).

Game: Columbia at Penn (7:00 PM Eastern)
Pick: 2 units on Columbia +12.5

This is a battle of the Ivy League’s worst performer in terms of being a home favorite in Penn against the Ivy's best road dog - Columbia. Like Princeton, Penn is always given too much respect in Ivy League home games and has covered just 42% of them and less than 40% when they are a double-digit home favorite over the last nine years! Columbia has covered 59% of their Ivy road games the last nine years and has been a magnificent 11-2 ATS as a double digit road dog in the Ivy in their last 13 games. We will take the dog again in another inflated Ivy League point-spread.

This will be a huge match-up featuring little known Winthrop vs. Missouri State. Missouri St. is not quite the team that got snubbed from last year's NCAA tournament but they can still play. If you don't know about Winthrop you will, as they will most definitely be a part of the NCAA field of “Madness.” Winthrop is 22-4, and all you have to do is look at what they did. They took #3 RPI Wisconsin to OT, on Wisconsin's home floor - something no Big Ten team could do. They also had #4 RPI North Carolina down eight points at the half before wilting down the stretch to lose by eight points. They also went to SEC's Ole Miss and handed them an 11-point loss so this team has some game. Missouri St. has lost three games in the competitive Missouri Valley Conference, which shows they are certainly vulnerable and will have their hands full with Winthrop in this one. If things break right, Winthrop wins this one outright but we will take the points.

Yale has gotten attention with a nine point win over Penn, then the following week turn around and lose to Cornell. There has been a building increase in competitiveness in this game over the last five years. Yale had dominated Dartmouth completely winning all six games from 2002-04, by margins of 38, 29, 28, 18, 17 and 10 points. Over the last two years, those margins have been dramatically reduced. Yale has lost the last two games played at Dartmouth, and have won at home by just four and 11 points the last two years. This line is inflated from Yale's big win over Penn, so there is no value on Yale here. The distance between these two teams is much less than this inflated line so we will take the dog.