2009 Men's NCAA Tournament First Round Picks: East Region, March 19

At CBBPlace.com, we've been doing College Basketball Picks Against the Spread all season. There are five of us from CBBPlace who also write on B/R: Ryan, Mitch, Dave, Shaun, and Steve. There is a very good chance that if you have been following college basketball this season (even just casually), you have read something by one of us.

With that in mind, we have decided to do our first ever collaboration article—we are all going to do quick picks against the spread for the NCAA Tournament, and they will be posted in a series of articles broken out by the date of the game and region of the tournament.

We have posted well over 1,000 Free Picks Against the Spread this season and have amassed more than 500,000 hits since the site went up at the end of January! The bottom line: Hopefully we know a little something about the teams involved in these games!

NCAA Tournament—East Region

Thursday, March 19

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No. 2 Duke vs. No. 15 Binghamton
9:40 PM EST

	Record	Conf	ATS	PF	PA
No. 2 Duke	27-6	11-5	14-14-1	78.0	65.5
No. 15 Binghamton	23-8	13-3	4-1	70.2	66.8

	FG%	D. FG%	3P%	D. 3P%	FT%	RPG	SPG	APG	TPG	BPG
No. 2 Duke	44.9	42.9	34.4	33.5	72.3	39.5	8.6	13.4	12.6	4.1
No. 15 Binghamton	43.8	40.9	33.0	31.7	67.3	38.3	7.0	12.1	13.3	4.2

Line: Duke -22.5

Mitch: Duke -22.5—Coach K's team makes a statement.
Dave: Duke -22.5—Should win by 30, but not confident that they cover.
Ryan: Binghamton +22.5—The ACC Tourney winners don't kill themselves in this one.
Shaun: Duke -22.5—The Blue Devils will have this game locked up before halftime.

No. 3 Villanova vs. No. 14 American University
7:20 PM EST

	Record	Conf	ATS	PF	PA
No. 3 Villanova	26-7	13-5	15-13	76.5	67.0
No. 14 American	24-7	13-1	4-2	64.5	58.4

	FG%	D. FG%	3P%	D. 3P%	FT%	RPG	SPG	APG	TPG	BPG
No. 3 Villanova	45.7	40.4	36.8	33.9	74.2	41.1	8.0	14.8	13.4	3.2
No. 14 American	46.6	39.4	37.7	33.0	64.8	35.7	5.4	13.1	13.2	2.5

Line: Villanova -18.0

Mitch: Villanova -18.0—EZ.
Dave: Villanova -18.0—Shooters who have survived banging Big East.
Ryan: Villanova -18.0—Scottie Reynolds finds his missing mojo from the Big East Tourney.
Shaun: Villanova -18.0—Nova will cruise in essentially a home game against a weak opponent.

No. 6 UCLA vs. No. 11 VCU
9:50 PM EST

	Record	Conf	ATS	PF	PA
No. 6 UCLA	25-8	13-5	17-13	76.0	63.3
No. 11 VCU	24-9	14-4	12-15-2	72.0	63.4

	FG%	D. FG%	3P%	D. 3P%	FT%	RPG	SPG	APG	TPG	BPG
No. 6 UCLA	49.4	44.5	39.8	36.2	72.1	36.0	8.4	15.7	12.4	3.2
No. 11 VCU	46.3	39.7	36.9	33.4	70.5	37.4	7.6	13.8	12.7	4.6

Line: UCLA -7.0

Mitch: VCU +7.0—Four letter word for overrated: UCLA.
Dave: UCLA -7.0—Senior leadership that has been tested in top tier league.
Ryan: UCLA -7.0—The Bruins bounce back after losing to a hot USC team in the Pac-10 Tourney.
Shaun: VCU +7.0—VCU will give UCLA all it can handle, and could even win this game outright.

No. 7 Texas vs. No. 10 Minnesota

	Record	Conf	ATS	PF	PA
No. 7 Texas	22-11	9-7	10-17	72.3	65.5
No. 10 Minnesota	22-10	9-9	12-15	66.5	61.1

	FG%	D. FG%	3P%	D. 3P%	FT%	RPG	SPG	APG	TPG	BPG
No. 7 Texas	44.2	40.6	32.1	34.0	67.1	42.0	6.2	13.0	12.5	5.5
No. 10 Minnesota	44.2	39.8	32.7	34.4	71.5	38.4	8.4	14.2	14.5	6.2

Line: Texas -3.5

Mitch: Texas -3.5—Texas is too athletic.
Dave: Minnesota +3.5—Love the straight up pick of deep Gopher team.
Ryan: Texas -3.5—The fast-paced Big 12 is going to be too much for the Big Ten.
Shaun: Texas -3.5—The inconsistent Longhorns are better than the Gophers, but which Texas team will show up?

If you enjoyed these picks, please take a look at CBBPlace.com, where we will be picking every March Madness game!

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Please take a look at our other NCAA Tournament First Round Picks:

Midwest Region, March 20
East Region, March 20
South Region, March 19
South Region, March 20
West Region, March 19
West Region, March 20