Kent State vs. Youngstown State Betting Odds & Pick: November 18th 2009

Kent State vs. Youngstown State
Free Pick: Youngstown State +3 -110 betting odds
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We should be seeing a down year from Kent St. this season at least in the beginning. The Golden Flashes lost three starters from last season and even though there are six seniors on the team, experience is still an issue. This will be a team to keep an eye on once conference action gets going but the chemistry may be an issue in the early part of the season. That is even more so playing its first road game of the season. The Golden Flashes have played three games already this season with all three of those games coming at home where they went 2-1. Despite the winning record, the results were not great. Ken St. has been outshot by 4.8 percent as the defense has allowed 48.8 percent shooting from the floor and even though it is just three games in, this team was about defense last season as it allowed opponents to shoot only 41.1 percent from the field. The Golden Flashes have also has trouble from long range as they are hitting only 27.7 percent from behind the arc. Youngstown St. has played two games and while its numbers are not as games, it is justified. Playing Xavier will do that to a team as the Penguins shot only 32.8 percent including 7.7 percent from three-point range (1-13). They bounced back in their last game against Hiram which was basically a glorified exhibition but it restored some confidence after the debacle at Xavier. This is a team on the rise and that has not been said in a long time in Youngstown. The Penguins have four starters back from last season and this is big since in each of the last two seasons, they have has to replace their two top scorers so there is finally some continuity on the floor in the beginning of the season. They exceeded expectations last season as picked to finish 10th in the Horizon League, they finished sixth, thanks to seven league wins which tied for the most ever since joining. Things could have been even better as six of their losses came by five points or fewer, three of which came on the road. DeAndre Mays, Sirlester Martin and Kelvin Bright and Vytas Sulskis all averaged between 9.6 and 11.4 ppg last season and with an even deeper team this year, the Penguins are no longer pushovers. Depth and experience are the two keys that head coach Jerry Slocum is hoping will carry the Penguins this season. He can go nine or 10 players deep on the bench and he used 12 players against Hiram and the three on the roster who didn’t play are all being redshirted this season. “We are a totally different team from a year ago at this time,” Slocum said. “Everything now has been a lot more constructive, just because they’ve been around for a year.” These teams have met in each of the last four years and Youngstown St. has covered all four of those meetings. Those lines were all double-digits so this short number really shows how the gap has closed and the linesmakers are well aware. That has made the public once again ride Kent St. and fade the Penguins and that is a mistake here. Play on teams that won between 20 and 40 percent of their games from last season where the line is +3 to -3 and are coming off a home win, playing a team that had a winning record last year. This situation is 43-16 ATS (72.9 percent) since 1997. 3* Youngstown St. Penguins