2 Best College Basketball Bets and Player Props for Houston vs. Purdue

The final matchup of the Round of 16 takes place at 10:09 p.m. ET Friday and pits 1 seed Houston against 4 seed Purdue. The Cougars enter as a sizable favorite.

To see thoughts on other games, check out our full men's college basketball tournament predictions page. But for Houston vs. Purdue, here are my favorite bets in FanDuel Sportsbook's college basketball betting odds.

Betting Picks for Houston vs. Purdue

Houston -7.5 (-120)

After beating a Gonzaga squad that sits in the top 10 by both Torvik and KenPom, Houston's difficult tournament path continues against Purdue, a team KenPom and Torvik both slot 16th. Even though Purdue will have an advantage with the game in Indy, Houston should be up for the challenge.

Purdue has played a difficult schedule, the ninth-hardest, per KenPom. They've played a whopping 12 games against Torvik top-25 teams, going 5-7 in the split. But of the five wins, four of them came at home and one was at a neutral site. In seven games in the split that were on the road or at a neutral site, Purdue went 1-6, with the six losses coming by an average of 10.2 points.

In short, when the Boilers faced elite teams outside of Mackey, they struggled, and while the Indy crowd will be favorable for Purdue, one of their neutral-site losses was a 70-66 defeat in Indy at the hands of Texas A&M. And the one time Purdue played a truly top-tier team away from home, Auburn smashed them, 87-69.

Another factor pushing me toward Houston is that Purdue ended the year with a whimper. Over its final nine regular-season games (counting the Big 10 tourney), Purdue went 3-6, with five of the six losses coming by at least eight points. The Boilermakers have somewhat steadied the ship to make it to the second weekend of the tournament, but to get here, they've had to play only a 12 seed and a 13 seed. In their last neutral-site game against a Torvik top-25 team, Purdue lost by 18 to Michigan in the Big Ten tourney, which was held in Indianapolis.

Houston, meanwhile, has lost once since the start of December -- an OT loss at home to Texas Tech. In fact, three of Houston's four defeats this season were overtime games, and the other was a five-point loss to Auburn.

The Cougars are ranked first overall on Torvik and second on KenPom. Defensively, they're as good as it gets, checking in first on both ratings sites. Their defense should be able to make life difficult for Purdue's Braden Smith and Trey Kaufman-Renn, two players who combine for an eye-popping 58.0% usage rate.

If either of the Boilers' big two is bottled up by the Cougars, I don't know how Purdue scores enough to make this a close game since Purdue relies heavily on Smith (43.2% assist rate) and TKR (16.9%) to both score and get shots for others. No other Purdue regular has an assist rate above 10.4%. And if Purdue swaps out 6-foot-10 forward Caleb Furst (4.2 PPG) for more of an offensive threat, the Cougars may feast on the glass.

All in all, Houston is better, is in better form of late and might be a pretty bad matchup for a Purdue team that is super dependent on two players offensively. While I like taking Houston to cover, I'm also intrigued by Houston -10.5 in the alternate spread markets.

J'wan Roberts Over 5.5 Rebounds (-140)

For the season, J'wan Roberts is averaging 6.3 rebounds per game. The fifth-year senior averaged 6.8 and 7.7 boards per game the previous two years. I like him to snag at least six rebounds on Friday.

Roberts has totaled at least six rebounds in each of the last six games in which he's logged 30-plus minutes, including eight rebounds against the Zags last time out. Barring an injury or foul trouble, he should be in for plenty of minutes in this one, and the risk of foul trouble isn't as high if Houston puts Joseph Tugler on Trey Kaufman-Renn.

Rebounding has been an issue at times this year for Purdue, especially when they've gone up against teams with strong interior options (Texas A&M, UCLA, Indiana and Auburn). A&M had an offensive rebound rate of 48.3% in their win over Purdue back in December.

Roberts and the Cougars should be a handful on the glass, and I'm backing him to pull down at least six boards.

You can also click here to get our updated printable Men's College Basketball Tournament bracket for the Round of 16.

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The above author is a FanDuel employee and is not eligible to compete in public daily fantasy contests or place sports betting wagers on FanDuel. The advice provided by the author does not necessarily represent the views of FanDuel. Taking the author's advice will not guarantee a successful outcome. You should use your own judgment when participating in daily fantasy contests or placing sports wagers.