Ohio State vs TCU: Game Preview & Best Bets (East Region, 2025-2026 NCAA Tournament)

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Ohio State vs TCU: Game Preview

Ohio State vs TCU is, in our opinion, one of the most underrated games of the entire first round of the NCAA tournament. It all starts with the most important battle: Ohio State's most prolific scorer, Bruce Thornton, will have to face TCU's high hedge/trapping defensive style.

Our initial reaction to this matchup was to look for Bruce Thornton's assist prop - after all, we're college sports bettors at heart. But that number (as of writing) was sitting all the way up at 5.5 in some places, which may be too many even with TCU funneling point guards into pass-first positions with that high hedge defense. Look under the hood and you'll also see that Jake Diebler has used Bruce Thornton off the ball at a 72nd percentile rate this year, up massively from the 16th percentile in the same statistic last year.

We then looked around to see what else was out there and came to the conclusion that there wasn't anything on Ohio State that we liked. John Mobley should be the three point shooter of choice against this defense, but his point total is a little steep at 15.5 as of writing.

On the other side of the ball, Ohio State is likely to play a weak drop coverage that allows looks at the rim. We have our eyes on both David Punch and Xavier Edmonds for the over on their points, with a lean towards Edmonds at 12.5 points for his line. Edmonds' biggest worry spot is his propensity to get into foul trouble, but when he gets to 25+ minutes he is 11-3 on the over at this number.

Ohio State vs TCU: Best Bet

• Xavier Edmonds over 12.5 points (-115 on most books as of this writing)

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