College Basketball Odds, Prediction for Bryant vs UMass Lowell: Why to Bet Bulldogs

Bryant Bulldogs vs UMass Lowell River Hawks Odds

Let's dive into the college basketball odds for the Bryant Bulldogs vs. UMass Lowell River Hawks and make a prediction for Tuesday's America East Tournament game.

I’m back to provide picks and leans for my beloved America East Conference Tournament semifinals.

Let’s start with the shooting variance bloodbath that was the first round.

RIP to our Maine 50-1 futures. So unfair.

With Vermont hosting New Hampshire and Lowell hosting Bryant, we should stay focused on future results instead of crying over spilled milk.

Bryant shot way over its head in the quarterfinal matchup.

Rafael Pinzon started the game 6-for-6 from 3 on his way to 35 points. Maine was cooked from the start because the Bulldogs are impossible to stop when they get going like that.

Typically, we could easily project Bryant for some game-to-game negative regression.

But I’m looking at this matchup in a different light.

Lowell got into a dogfight with UMBC on Saturday. Dion Brown and Marcus Banks put on a masterclass, combining for 42 points by leveraging their disgusting dribble and shot creation.

But here’s the problem.

Lowell fully took advantage of UMBC’s porous interior defense. Coach Pat Duquette tweaked his flex-motion offense after the Kareem Abdoul-Coulibaly injury, relentlessly attacking the rim with two frontcourt matchup problems in Quinton Mincey and Cam Morris. The River Hawks either score at the rim, draw a foul or grab the offensive rebound.

In that quarterfinal matchup, Lowell scored 42 paint points, shot 31 free throws and grabbed 16 offensive rebounds.

And the game still went to overtime.

The job won’t be as easy in the semi-finals.

This year, the best thing to happen in Smithfield, Rhode Island, was the (some would say forced) resignment of former head coach Jared Grasso. First-year head coach Phil Martelli Jr. abandoned his predecessor's goofy-and-hole-filled extended matchup zone in favor of an aggressive ball-screen denial defense that leverages the Bulldogs’ elite wing talent and athleticism to rotate and scramble in rim denial.

Some Houston ball-screen blitz, Iowa State no-middle rim denial, and Virginia pack-line elements are baked in. Still, the result is an attacking defense that swarms the paint and blocks every shot – Daniel Rivera, Connor Withers and Earl Timberlake combine for over five blocks per game this year, and the Bulldogs lead the AmEast in block rate (15%) by a mile.

That’s a tough matchup for the rim-reliant River Hawks – much tougher than the one they just faced.

So, how did Lowell sweep Bryant this year?

Because across two head-to-head matchups, the River Hawks shot 18-for-39 (46%) from 3 while the Bulldogs shot 7-for-38 (18%).

But Bryant arguably outplayed the rim-based River Hawks across the two meetings when it came to pure, interior-based offense.

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Of course, Bryant’s aggressive nature feeds into two of Lowell’s favorite paths to offense: free throws and offensive rebounds. The Hawks generated 15 second-chance points and 29 FTAs in the first meeting and 26 FTAs in the second.

But Bryant is an elite interior defense that would've kept up with Lowell with typical perimeter shooting splits.

The Timberlake injury is a severe issue. I’m hearing he’s likely out for the season with a broken shooting hand. All this after putting together arguably the best individual season of any America East player.

That said, I’m still not confident that Lowell’s Max Brooks is healthy. The big man is the team’s best interior defender, and after limping through the end of the year, he came down hard on his leg in the quarterfinal matchup and was hobbling around before finishing the game strong.

Additionally, Rivera was a monster in the quarterfinal win over the Black Bears, recording two blocks, a steal, four assists and 15 rebounds. He transformed into the glue guy that Timberlake’s always been.

Meanwhile, I actually think Bryant could space the floor better with more minutes going to sharpshooters like Pinzon, Withers, Doug Edert, and even Miles Latimer (from the lead photo). On the year, about 48% of Bryant’s catch-and-shoot opportunities are coming unguarded, but nine of the Bulldogs’ 14 (64%) were unguarded in the quarterfinal victory against Maine's excellent defense.

Spacing the floor and making 3-point shots is crucial against Lowell, which often uses drop-coverage defensive elements to deny perimeter shots — i.e., overplaying ball-handlers on the perimeter and spot-up shooters on the wing, funneling on-ball creators into the midrange. The River Hawks were arguably the league’s best 3-point defense this year, which showed in both head-to-head matchups.

But Lowell’s 3-point defense regressed a bit down the stretch, and Bryant is begging for positive shooting regression in this matchup with a lineup more suited toward sharpshooting.

So, screw it. I like the Bulldogs to buck the trends on Tuesday in Lowell.

Besides, our Action PRO Model projects the Bulldogs as only 2.5-point road ‘dogs at Costello Athletic Center. I’ll trust that math.

Pick: Bryant +6 (Play to +5)

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