The UNC Greensboro Spartans take on the Chattanooga Mocs in Chattanooga, TN. Tip-off is set for 5 p.m. ET on CBS Sports Network.
Chattanooga is favored by 4 points on the spread with a moneyline of -175. The total is set at 143 points.
Here are my UNC Greensboro vs. Chattanooga predictions and college basketball picks for January 9, 2025.
UNC Greensboro vs Chattanooga Prediction
My Pick: Chattanooga -3.5 or Better
My UNC Greensboro vs Chattanooga best bet is on the Mocs spread, with the best odds currently available at FanDuel. For all of your college basketball bets, find the best lines using our live NCAAB odds page.
UNC Greensboro vs Chattanooga Odds, Spread
| UNC Greensboro Odds | ||
|---|---|---|
| Spread | Total | Moneyline |
+4 -110 | 143 -110 / -110 | +145 |
| Chattanooga Odds | ||
|---|---|---|
| Spread | Total | Moneyline |
-4 -110 | 143 -110 / -110 | -175 |
- UNC Greensboro vs Chattanooga spread: Chattanooga -4
- UNC Greensboro vs Chattanooga over/under: 143 points
- UNC Greensboro vs Chattanooga moneyline: Chattanooga -175, UNC Greensboro +145
- UNC Greensboro vs Chattanooga best bet: Chattanooga -3.5 or Better
My UNC Greensboro vs Chattanooga NCAAB Betting Preview
The Mocs were among the SoCon preseason favorites, but they've looked horrific since. Trey Bonham and Honor Huff are two All-SoCon guards who have played with drunk goggles for most of the season.
Chattanooga is still 9-6, but it’s posted head-scratching losses against Austin Peay and Mercer, the latter coming in overtime in the conference play opener. The Mocs have dropped 50 spots in KenPom’s ratings from the preseason.
Meanwhile, UNC Greensboro is 2-0 in conference play, with wins over Furman and Wofford, making it a wildly impressive start to the year. Head coach Mike Jones brought in a pretty good transfer class — led by Radford import Kenyon Giles and his 18 points per game — and it seems to be paying off in the early going.
That said, the Spartans’ two wins look pretty fortunate in retrospect. They shot 21-for-47 (45%) from 3 while opponents shot 18-for-58 (31%). They lead the SoCon in 3-point shooting and 3-point shooting allowed through two conference games, which is sure to regress.
Meanwhile, the Mocs likely only lost to Mercer because the Bears drained 15 of their 30 attempted triples.
This feels like the perfect buy-low, sell-high spot.
From a schematic perspective, Chattanooga runs a perimeter-oriented hub-based dribble-handoff offense. Bonham and Huff shoot the lights out from deep and drag defenders toward the perimeter, which opens up cutting lanes for leading scorer Bash Wieland off the wing (14 PPG).
That should work against the Spartans, as they run an uber-compact defense that ranks 236th nationally in 3-point rate allowed and 349th in Open 3 Rate allowed. There will be plenty of opportunities for open jumpers.
Greensboro’s luck bears repeating under this light, as opponents shouldn’t keep shooting just 28% from 3 based on the volume of open looks the Spartans allow. ShotQuality projects opponents should shoot closer to 33% from deep the rest of the way based on the “quality” of looks.
It’s the perfect storm for Chattanooga to fire away from deep and open up those cutting lanes as the game progresses. While the Spartans are a reasonably solid cut-denial defense, they’ve struggled to stop those sets on a per-possession basis (1.25 PPP allowed, 27th percentile).
I’m not that high on the Mocs' defense. However, Chattanooga ranks 32nd nationally in Open 3 Rate allowed, which will be key against Greensboro’s spread pick-and-roll offense that's due for negative regression from beyond the arc.
If the Spartans can’t make their 3s, I don’t believe in their interior offense. They rank sub-320th nationally in 2-point shooting (45%) and 2-point scoring distribution (43%), and their offense dries up quickly when the long ball stops dropping.
Most advanced analytics models project Greensboro as a slight road favorite, and our Action PRO model projects the game as a pick'em.
Still, the Spartans are due for a loss based on regression and variance. Meanwhile, the analytical sites likely slightly undervalue the Mocs due to some general shooting unluckiness, and I like how they match up with Greensboro.
