by Josh Goodson
Wake Forest and Duke meet for the second time in as many weeks, this round in Winston-Salem. Duke is 17-2 overall, 5-2 in the ACC and has to try to keep their focus on a team they just beat by double digits and not their upcoming home showdown with Virginia. Wake Forest is 8-11 overall and a mere 1-6 in ACC play. A win tonight might allow them to start dreaming about the NCAA Tournament again, though to be fair they haven’t played Pittsburgh or Georgia Tech yet.
Current Line: Duke -9.5
The line opened at 10 and I’m surprised it hasn’t gone the other way. Every time Duke wins they look unbeatable. Until they lose. The over/under is 165 which is a bit tricky–Duke tends to draw high o/u because they score AND give up a lot of points, but Wake has only scored more than 71 points once in ACC play.
Note to consider
- -Duke is 1-5 ATS in their last 6 games vs. Wake Forest in Winston-Salem
- -5 of the last 6 Duke/Wake games in Winston-Salem have gone OVER the total
- -Out of the 17 duke games with point totals this year, 13 have gone over
- -Duke is 4-6 ATS in their last 10 games as a road favorite.
Conclusion? 10 is still a lot of points for a road ACC game this season, so give us Wake Forest +9.5. And if they’re gonna do it, they’re gonna have to score a bunch so let’s stick with the trends and take the over. But maybe just but a “for fun” waver on this one, not the kid’s tuition. Duke could win 90-70 and miss both those.
