This Big Ten showdown may not be as big as its football counterpart, but Wisconsin-Ohio State is still easily commanding the most tickets on Friday's college basketball slate.
The public is split on this spread, not knowing whether it's safe to hammer the No. 5-ranked Buckeyes squad or take the points with Wisconsin.
Sharp bettors have made a very clear decision, though.
After opening at -10, -10.5 or even -11 at some books, sharps have been fading the hell out of the highly-ranked Buckeyes.
Steam Moves have hit Wisconsin at +10, +9 and +8.5 thus far, which has helped the line move all the way down to +7. While tickets are nearly split 50/50, more than 80% of the cash is on the Badgers. After seeing this data and the line movement, there are no questions about the sharp activity.
If you caught yesterday's article about the low-profile Seattle-UMKC game, you may have read about how conference games offer edges that don't really exist in non-conference play.
With conference action off and running, it's not surprising to see the pros hop on the Badgers against a much-higher regarded Ohio State team as a double digit dog in the early going.
Per Bet Labs, Top 5 teams have historically covered at just a 47.3% rate vs. conference foes in a 1,000+ game sample size dating back to 2005.
With that in mind, plus multiple points of closing line value, anyone who took Wisconsin early is very happy with their ticket heading into tonight's game.
