The Drake Bulldogs take on the Northern Iowa Panthers in Cedar Falls, Iowa. Tip-off is set for 4 p.m. ET on ESPN2.
Drake is favored by 1 point on the spread with a moneyline of -115. The total is set at 126 points.
Here are my Drake vs. Northern Iowa predictions and college basketball picks for February 23, 2025.
Drake Bulldogs vs. Northern Iowa Panthers Prediction, Picks
- Pick: Under 126 (Play to 125)
My Northern Iowa vs Drake best bet is on the under, with the best odds currently available at DraftKings. For all of your college basketball bets, find the best lines using our live NCAAB odds page.
Drake vs. Northern Iowa Odds, Spread, Lines
| Drake Odds | ||
|---|---|---|
| Spread | Total | Moneyline |
+1.5 -110 | 125.5 -110 / -110 | +105 |
| Northern Iowa Odds | ||
|---|---|---|
| Spread | Total | Moneyline |
-1.5 -110 | 125.5 -110 / -110 | -125 |
- Drake vs Northern Iowa spread: Northern Iowa -1.5, Drake +1.5
- Drake vs Northern Iowa over/under: 125.5
- Drake vs Northern Iowa moneyline: Northern Iowa -125, Drake +105,
- Drake vs Northern Iowa best bet: Under 126 (Play to 125)
Spread
I'm passing on the spread.
Moneyline
I'm passing on the moneyline.
Over/Under
I'll take the under in what should be a low-possession game.
My Pick: Under 126 (Play to 125)
Drake vs. Northern Iowa NCAAB Preview
The top two teams in the Missouri Valley Conference are similar in that both Drake and Northern Iowa are rim-reliant offenses that grind the game to a halt.
Both teams are also very well coached by Ben McCollum and Ben Jacobson, respectively.
The difference is how the Bulldogs and Panthers get to the rim. Drake is a relentless middle pick-and-roll offense behind stud point guard Bennett Stirtz, while Northern Iowa works almost exclusively through Jacob Hutson the post.
Drake boasts a relatively undersized and flat-footed roster, so the Bulldogs’ interior and post-up defense has been shredded this season (.94 PPP allowed, 34th percentile, per Synergy).
At the same time, Northern Iowa’s ball-screen coverage at the point of attack has been poverty (.90 PPP allowed, fifth percentile, per Synergy).
These two met in late January and played a slogging, 55-possession game.
But Drake pulled out a 14-point victory (66-52) because Stirtz worked the Panthers in ball screens while McCollum schemed up the best Hutson/post-denial defense Northern Iowa had seen yet — Stirtz dropped 20 points and four assists, while Huston finished with one point on 0-for-4 shooting.
Will history repeat itself in the rematch?
I expect Jacobson to make some key adjustments in the rematch, but Drake is an elite road team (8-3 ATS, 10th in Haslametrics away-from-home metric), so I don’t think either unit has a big edge.
But I don’t expect either coach to try and speed up the pace, so we should see another ridiculously low-possession game with each team working exclusively in the half-court and 25 seconds into the shot clock.
And I wouldn’t be surprised to see the rematch be even lower scoring than the 118 combined points we saw from the two in the first meeting.
Drake and Northern Iowa combined to shoot 17-for-32 (53%) from deep in that matchup, and that hardly seems sustainable.
