VCU vs #25 Dayton College Basketball Odds Vegas in the last Friday of the 2024 Regular Season

February 9, 2024

Fridays are always slow around college basketball but that’s really the case this Friday with only three games, including a big one from the Atlantic 10 Conference as No. 18 Dayton, the league leader, visits contender VCU with the Flyers are short favorites on the NCAAB odds. 2024 NCAA Basketball Betting & Expert Analysis #18 Dayton vs VCU | MyBookie Sportsbook Week 14 NCAAB

How to Bet Dayton at VCU NCAA Basketball Odds & TV Info

When: Friday, 7 PM ET
Where: Stuart C. Siegel Center, Richmond
TV: ESPN2
Stream: ESPN+
Radio: Tunein.com
Opening NCAAB Lines: Dayton -0.5 (total 71)

Dayton vs VCU Series History

This is the first of two scheduled meetings with the teams set to close the regular season against one another in Dayton – and of course they could meet in the A-10 Tournament. Last year, VCU won two of three as they did meet in the conference tournament final and the Rams won 68-56 to earn the automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. VCU held Dayton to six points and no field goals over the final 10:12. The Flyers’ DaRon Holmes had 28 points and 16 rebounds, but didn’t get enough help in the second half. He’s still with the team. Rather strangely, Dayton has beaten VCU in its last two trips to the Siegel Center, while VCU is 3-0 in its last three games against the Flyers at UD Arena.

Why Bet on Dayton Flyers?

Dayton (19-3, 9-1 A-10) won its third game in a row Tuesday, 94-79 at a good Saint Joseph’s team. The Hawks took a 38-34 lead into the second half, but the Flyers quickly erased it as the visitors opened the half on a 27-6 run with a layup by Nate Santos making it 61-44 in favor of Dayton. Saint Joseph’s fought back, but the Flyers kept the Hawks at a distance, allowing them to get no closer than 10 points.

UD’s 60 second-half points were the most scored after halftime by the Flyers since 63 against Central Connecticut State on Dec. 27, 1993 (Dayton scored 66 in the first half against VCU on Jan. 12, 2018.). It was the most points St. Joe’s has allowed in a half all season.

“We’ve played a lot of good teams this year,” Saint Joseph’s coach Billy Lange said. “They’re as good a team as we’ve played.”

All five Flyer starters scored in double figures for the first time this season. Kobe Elvis and Nate Santos each led all scorers with 21 points, the second time this season two Flyers scored at least 20. Javon Bennett had 18, DaRon Holmes II had 13 and Enoch Cheeks added 12. Elvis, who was 8-for-13 from deep, added a career-high 10 assists for his first career double-double.

“He did a great job sharing it, did a great job being aggressive, did a great job in terms of understanding defensively the assignment and making it difficult for those guys,” Dayton coach Anthony Grant said of Elvis.

The Flyers climbed one spot to No. 16 in the NCAA Evaluation Tool with their third straight victory and moved into first place in the A-10 by a half game over Richmond.

Holmes is on three prestigious preseason watch lists — A Naismith Award, Wooden Award and the Karl Malone Award. Holmes leads the A-10 in scoring (19.7) and UD in rebounding (7.6). He is the only player in the league’s Top 10 in scoring, rebounding, FG%, and blocked shots. He is the only player in D-I who has more than 50 blocks, 50 dunks and 50 assists. Holmes has 50, 51 and 56 respectively. No other player even has 40. Holmes also has 22 threes and is shooting .386 (22-57) from deep. He had a total of seven threes in his first two years at UD.

Koby Brea leads the nation in three-point shooting (minimum 2.5 attempts per game) at 48.4%. As a team, Dayton is fifth in D-I in 3-pt. FG% (.400, 210-525). The school record is .392. Brea is fourth at UD in career 3-pt. FG% (.418, 183-438). Bennett is second in the A-10 in assist-to-turnover ratio (2.9) and leads UD in steals (28).

Why Bet on VCU Rams?

VCU (15-8, 7-3 A-10) won its second game in a row Tuesday, 75-60 at Fordham. VCU trailed by just a point at the break, 32-31, thanks to a Will Richardson jumper just before the halftime buzzer, VCU scored the first nine points of the second half to take a 41-31 lead 3:44 into the period. A Japhet Medor jumper with 15:49 on the clock halted the VCU run and Fordham trailed by eight again with 14:44 remaining, 43-35, following an Abdou Tsimbila dunk but the visitors netted nine unanswered points to take a commanding 52-35 lead midway through the second half. The closest Fordham would get the rest of the way was 12, 54-52, on a Medor three with 5:31 left.

Fordham committed just four turnovers in the first half but had eleven in the second. The game featured players on two extremes of college basketball with Fordham’s Kyle Rose in his fifth year with the Rams while VCU’s Joe Bamisile is playing for his fourth different team over the past four years. VCU’s roster features eight newcomers, seven of them transfers as the Rams had to replace their top seven scorers from their 2022-23 A-10 Championship team.

“They were certainly the aggressor early,” VCU coach Ryan Odom said of Fordham. “But our guys responded in a positive way, kind of settled into the game. We were able to regroup (at halftime), and our guys did a better job of taking care of the ball, a better job defending the 3-point line and drives to the basket, and certainly a better job rebounding. To be able to finish the game the way that we did was a positive.”

Rams guard Max Shulga filled up the box score with 13 points, 10 rebounds, seven assists and a steal on the way to his fifth career double-double. He connected on 3-of-5 attempts from beyond the 3-point arc in the contest Bamisile added 13 points and knocked down 3-of-5 from beyond the arc. Transfer Sean Bairstow, who missed the past two games with a rib injury, returned to the VCU lineup and provided 12 points, eight rebounds and a pair of assists.

Bairstow said protecting the ball was a key point of the halftime conversations. VCU committed just four second-half turnovers.

“That’s something we’ve been good at throughout the year,” Bairstow said. “If we have kind of a blaah half, we’re able to contain it in the second half. I think it was just getting accustomed to what they were doing, they were reaching (in) a lot. So just being more conscious of that.”

VCU has clamped down on defense following an 0-2 start to A-10 play. In the past eight games, seven of them victories, VCU opponents averaged 60.0 points, while shooting .365 from the field and .190 from 3-point range. The Rams rank sixth nationally in effective field goal defense (.445)… VCU is also shooting.

Offensively, they have assisted on 58.2 percent of their field goals, which is VCU’s highest rate since the 2010-11 campaign, when the Rams assisted on 60.2 percent of buckets. VCU currently leads the A-10 in 3-point shooting (.402) in conference games, as well as 3-point defense (.269) in league contests. The team’s +2.9 rebounding margin overall is its largest since 2003-04.

Dayton vs VCU Expert Prediction

VCU 66, Dayton 65