Outkick Bets: Betting Texas Tech/Tennessee

TEXAS TECH VS. #13 TENNESSEE (-3.5)

The Jimmy V Classic suits another edition in New York and one of the matchups is an inviting one. Tennessee plays Texas Tech in a game that’ll be worthy of our time.

The Vols are rolling into the Garden winners of four straight and are feeling themselves a bit after pulling away from Colorado in the second half of their most recent game and added that to their stretch of four consecutive wins by double-digits too. They did so with freshman Kennedy Chandler making as many field goals in a game (13) by a Vol in nearly 9 years. Tennessee is a great ball movement team, as per usual, and right now they lead the SEC is assists per game and assist-to-turnover ratio.

Texas Tech waltzes in hot off their first loss of the season (Providence) and are looking to prove themselves wary in this season. Their schedule is littered with lower-end mid-major teams that haven’t got the bodies to continuously push the Red Raiders. Tennessee is by far the most talented team Texas Tech will have played this far. Tech is also getting Terrence Shannon Jr. back into form. He missed the first three games and since returning has been more than capable, scoring at least 15 in his four games back.

I stand with Rick Barnes tonight. He’s 33-4 all-time against Texas Tech and is on the superior end of the player spectrum in 2021. They’ve also been more tested, playing Colorado, North Carolina and Villanova, only losing the ‘Nova game. Give me the experienced, talented and battle-tested Vols tonight and I’ll buy it to -3.