#781 ASA PLAY ON 8* St Bonaventure +1.5 over LSU, Saturday at 1:45 PM ET - Big coaching mismatch here in our opinion. St Bonnies head coach Schmidt is one of the best in the country. He’s been at STB for 14 years and took over a program that was 24-88 the 4 years previous to him taking the job and turned them into a perennial A10 contender. They were the best team in the Atlantic 10 all season long and they won the conference tourney rolling over the 2 other top teams in the league (St Louis & VCU) by double digits to close out as A10 tournament champions. LSU has a bunch of talent each year as HC Will Wade can recruit (although they are under investigation under his watch) but they underperform quite often. This year they are very young (329th in experience) and rated as the 4th best team in the SEC. The Tigers just went through a grueling tourney run losing to Bama in the finals which could take a lot out of this team. LSU is a historically a team that will overlook a team like St Bonnies, especially coming off 3 games in 3 days last weekend. The Tigers love to run and will be stymied here by a STB team that is one of the slowest in the nation. We expect the Bonnies to control the pace and frustrate this young LSU team. STB is a veteran team with 4 junior starters (all started last year) and a fantastic defensively ranking 17th nationally in defensive efficiency. The only 3 teams in the SEC that ranked higher than St Bonnies on the defensive end were Bama, Tennessee, and Arkansas and LSU had a 2-3 record vs those teams. LSU’s defense has been lacking for much of the year (125th nationally) and facing a St Bonaventure team whose starters all average 12.7 PPG or more will be a problem. For most, this line of LSU -1.5 may seem really easy to take the SEC team. We have STB ranked higher than LSU and we expect them to win. The Bonnies have been underdogs just 4 times this year and covered 3 of those games. Take the points.