The Duke Blue Devils defeated the Syracuse Orange, 69-65, on Friday, March 23 in the First Four round of March Madness. The Blue Devils entered as an 11-point favorite but failed to cover the spread. Meanwhile, the game went over the total of 131.5.
The Blue Devils will now move on to face the No. 1 Kansas Jayhawks in the Elite Eight. We’ll soon see odds for that betting matchup BetDSI Sportsbook but we anticipate this game opening up at about a PICK. Both teams are evenly matched and have strong reputations. While Kansas is a No. 1 seed, Duke has been one of the favorites to win the NCAA Tournament, so they might be favored by one or two points in this game.
The Blue Devils were again led by their two studs Marvin Bagley III and Grayson Allen. Bagley III had 22 points, eight rebounds and six threes. As for Allen, he had a rough shooting night (four-of-15) but still had 15 points, eight assists and a pair of steals. He was three-of-14 from the three but made his only shot from inside the arc. Tyus Battle led the way for Syracuse with 19 points while Oshae Brissett had 15 and Marek Dolezaj added 13. The main issue for the Orange was turnovers as they had 16 overall. That sunk them even though they shot a healthy 49% from the field. This was the second time this season that Duke topped Syracuse. The Blue Devils won 60-44 at home on February 24th when they hosted Syracuse in ACC conference play. This game clearly played out quite differently.
The Blue Devils odds to win March Madness were +550 to win. They were second in line only to Villanova. As for the Jayhawks, they were posted at +1700 to win the NCAA Tournament before it started and they remain one of the favorites to win it all.
