2024 FTN NFL Power Rankings Through Week 15: Who Takes Over the Top Spot?
Daniel Kelley
Multiple times each week, FTN Bets’ resident college basketball junkie, Brad Evans, will attempt to posterize the ‘books with his favorite selections, whether sides, totals, teasers or parlays. As always, fade or follow Brad’s picks — fading is encouraged — that’s up to you.
2-leg alternative line parlay play: Illinois (ML), North Carolina (+7.5) (Tipico Sportsbook)
Odds: +122
Leg 1: Wisconsin at Illinois (ML)
A large boulder the size of a large boulder is not only making highways in Montezuma County impassable, it’s also clogging the paint in the Big Ten. Kofi Cockburn is one of college basketball’s true elite post presences. He’s an asteroid-enormous, shot-altering, rebound-squeezing, thunder-dunking center with a surprisingly delicate touch off the glass. The nation’s leader in double-doubles, he's a massive problem for a Badgers club that struggles scoring around the tin (47.9% 2PT% in B1G). Illinois’ half-to-half inconsistency has ripped out this scribe’s sparse hair this season, but exhibiting more level play in its past three wins (vs. Penn St., Iowa and at Indiana), it’s possible the Illini have rounded a corner. Wisconsin’s bevy of marksmen — Micha Potter, D’Mitrik Trice and Micah Potter each shoot at least 37% from three — is a concern, however, for Brad Underwood’s team, which ranks dead last in the conference in three-point percentage D. Still, if Cockburn is fed and Trent Frazier continues to light up the scoreboard (56 points in his last three), complementing all-world PG Ayo Dosunmu, Illinois should continue to nip at the paused Wolverines’ heels in the Big Ten regular season race. Keep in mind the Orange and Blue are one of only six teams nationally to rank inside the top-20 in offensive and defensive efficiency.
Leg 2: North Carolina (+7.5) at Duke
UNC/Duke may be one of the classic rivalries in all of sports, but this season the buzz is lacking. Both are hollowed husks compared to versions of yesteryear, two schools registering a faint pulse for the NCAA Tournament. Unbelievably, this is a bubble-blown game with play-in implications. Curmudgeon K versus Old Boy Roy. North Carolina’s pathetic offense versus Duke’s equally pathetic defense. Again, this won’t be your standard, high-level episode in the series. Give the nod to the Tar Heels. Yes, they couldn’t spit into the ocean from five feet out, evidenced by their No. 11 or lower league standing in effective field-goal percentage, two-point percentage and three-point percentage offense, but the Heels’ length and size should repeatedly crash the glass and cash on second-chance opportunities. In ACC action, they grab an offensive rebound at a 39.0% clip. If Day’Ron Sharpe, Armando Bacot and Garrison Brooks sport a hardhat, they will demoralize Duke inside. The Devils have allowed 1.031 points per possession and 51.4% on two-point shots. Carolina’s exterior defense is underwhelming yielding 37.7 percent along the arc in conference play, but Matthew Hurt is honestly Duke’s only reliable long-distance shooter. In what’s sure to be a tight contest, the alt-line is a sound wager.
Season record: 16-22
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