#651 ASA FREE PLAY ON Northwestern +10.5 over Maryland, Saturday at 3 PM ET - The Cats are 7-12 in the league and have dealt with injury issues but this team is very competitive losing a number of close games. They’ve only lost 1 game by more than 10 points all season long and that was @ Purdue way back on January 5th. This line opened NW +11 which is the highest spread the Cats have faced this season. Since the start of the 2022/23 season, NW has been a double digit dog only 3 times (2-1 ATS). When these 2 met in January Maryland was a 2 point favorite on the road and the Wildcats won 76-74 in OT and that was despite the Terps making 20 FT’s to just 12 for NW. Maryland’s largest lead in that game was just 6 points. NW is one of the slowest paced teams in the country (317th in adjusted tempo) and they’ve slowed their games down even more over the last few weeks turning them into slugfests which gives them the best chance to win. Their defense has played very well allowing just 61 PPG over their last 5 games. The Wildcats last 6 losses have all come by 7 points or less including games vs Wisconsin, UCLA, and Oregon. The Terps are tied for 3rd place in the Big 10 and fighting for a double bye in the Big 10 tourney but we expect NW will make this an ugly game and the Terps will have a tough time pulling away. 9 of the last 10 meetings in this series have been decided by single digits and Northwestern has actually won the last 3 meetings. This line is set too high in our opinion and we’ll take the points.