Ohio State at Illinois

It was almost conceded that the Ohio State Buckeyes would enter the Final Four as the #1 team in the country, and repeat their National Championship win from last season. That has not been the case for the Buckeyes, at least not yet. The Buckeyes public impression is offense, but the fact is their scoring is down by eight points per game vs. last season, and surprisingly the defense has been why they are unbeaten. The Buckeye stop unit is allowing just 13.9 ppg on the season, an improvement of eight ppg over last year's squad. That means Ohio State has seen a 16 ppg drop from their total points scored in their games from last year. Illinois has had a lot of empty offensive games vs. good defensive teams, scoring 14 or less four times this season, and have only surrendered 30+ in two games. Ohio State is now 8-1 to the UNDER in their last nine after a win, matched by the Illini's 7-1 mark to the UNDER in their last eight vs. a winning team. Play the UNDER.