The best sportsbooks for US players favor Kansas over Villanova. The Villanova Wildcats and the Kansas Jayhawks play on Saturday in the NCAA Tournament Final Four at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. Villanova has a 30-7 overall record this year. The Wildcats knocked off Houston in their previous tourney matchup. Kansas are 32-6. They are coming off an Elite Eight win over Miami.
In spite of Villanova’s dominance in the series, the Jayhawks are -4.5 point faves, per BettingPros. This point spread has slightly increased from an initial opening of -4. That movement may be because of the confirmation that Wildcats second-leading scorer, Justin Moore, will miss the game after he suffered a torn Achilles against Houston.
Villanova has covered the spread in all four NCAA Tournament games so far. They are 21-6 ATS in their past 27 tournament games overall. Kansas is 6-2 ATS in its past eight games. They have covered just two of their last seven NCAA Tournament games. The underdog has covered the spread in four of the last five encounters between these teams.
2022 Final Four Villanova vs. Kansas Odds
| Team | SP/RL | TOTAL | ML | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Villanova | +4½ ( -110 ) | 133 ( -110 ) | +165 |  |
| Kansas | -4½ ( -110 ) | 133 ( -110 ) | -190 | |
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Betting Villanova Wildcats
Champagne Villanova are underdogs at the best online sportsbooks. Villanova has only lost back to back games one time this year. That was back in mid-December. The Wildcats ran through St. John’s, UConn and Creighton for the conference championship.
Since then they have beat Delaware, Ohio State, Michigan and Houston in the national tournament. Against Houston on Saturday, the Wildcats had a respectable 27-20 lead at halftime. Villanova was outscored by one point in the second but still clung to the 50-44 win. Jermaine Samuels was the lead scorer with 16 points. He also had 10 rebounds for a double double.
Even with Moore, Villanova already had a shallow bench. They were rolling with a six-man rotation. Sixth man senior Caleb Daniels will take Moore’s spot. Meanwhile, Chris Arcidiacono will likely move up into the sixth man role.
Betting Kansas Jayhawks
The Jayhawks are favored at the best sportsbooks for US players. Kansas has only lost back-to-back games once this season as well. That was back in early March versus Baylor and TCU. The Jayhawks are on a nine-game winning streak.
They took out TCU, Texas, West Virginia, TCU again, Texas Tech, Texas Southern, Creighton, Providence and Miami in that run. In the Sunday Elite Eight game against Miami, Kansas was trailing 29-35 at halftime and not looking good. The Jayhawks bounced back after halftime. They scored 47 more points for a 76-50 win. Ochai Agbaji led the team with 18 points, five rebounds and four steals.
Agbaji is the team’s star. He made two three-pointers in the Elite Eight and scored 18 points in the win against Miami. Agbaji averages 18.9 points and shoots 39.7% from distance.
Villanova Wildcats vs. Kansas Jayhawks Final Four Pick
We’re going to take a chance on Villanova. The Wildcats are able to put up big offensive stats. They had 73 or more points in nine of 10 games heading into the conference tournament. Villanova has scored over 66 points in just two of seven games since. On the other hand they’ve held opponents to 65 or fewer points in all seven contests.
Regardless of what type of game this Final Four appearance becomes, Villanova should be prepared to compete. Kansas will be quite a solid opponent in this one. The Jayhawks have had a pair of close calls during this winning streak (the Texas and Providence games in particular) but other than that they haven’t had too many problems. We like this one to be a high scoring game with Villanova covering the best sportsbooks for US players’ point spread.
