Siena, after a stirring upset win over Ohio State in the tourney last year, is a 4-point dog to Purdue at online sportsbooks as well as in Nevada.  You know about the injury to Robbie Hummel of Purdue, and how important he is, but what about Clarence Jackson of Siena?  Jackson turned his ankle in practice over the weekend.

Jackson is “questionable, borderline doubtful” according to his coach , though teammates think he’ll play. He plays 2/3rds of their minutes, which is 4th on the team, and when he’s on the court he takes 27% of the shots, which is second on the team.  He shoots 32% from outside the arc, and he had nearly a third of the teams three-point attempts on the season.   Only has 29 assists in 33 games, so he’s a shooter. As a team fewer than 26% of their shots are 3-pointers, which is one of the lowest in the country.  He’s the only guy on the team shooting more than about 2.2 3’s per game, so they become even less perimeter oriented now. 

I wanted to see how he had done in their key wins but Siena’s Top 100 win was against Northeastern in a game where he scored 5 points.  He’s certainly far, far less important to his team than Hummel is to Purdue, but this isn’t a terribly deep club so the fact he’s the one proven 3-point threat hurts.  They’ve got a kid named Kyle Downey who has taken about 4 shots per game, with exactly half of them 3’s, who will likely get more action.  He was out for a month and a half and has been back for the last 4 games, but shot only 1-2 in the semi’s and finals of the conf tourney after seeing some solid action in the first round against Manhattan.

Siena lost to all the best teams they played in the regular season, but they did that last season as well. Pomeroy has them #58 after being #59 after the country following going 1-1 in the tourney last year.   So in some ways they have a similar profile to last season, though their losses to top teams in December last year saw them maintain contact with teams a little better.  But their star from last year Kenny Hasbrouk is in the NBDL and on the verge with signing a 10-day contract with the Heat.  I would say that Siena is not quite the team that they were last year, especially without Jackson, but Purdue is obviously a big step down from where they were with Hummel in the lineup.  Purdue is 0-4-1 against the spread since Hummel’s injury, with the non-covers being by 13, 0.5,  and 2 before the 29.5-point non-cover to Minnesota.

We’ll have more notes for college basketball bettors in the days ahead.