Gameday Pick ‘em #6: Mississippi Valley State (0-8)

The Pundits

“Stinnett to play in Tuesday’s game against Mississippi Valley State” (OWH)
“Jays ‘have a lot of work to do’” (OWH)
“Creighton’s longtime athletics chaplain dies” (OWH)

The Picks

I feel sorry for the Delta Devils, for a multitude of reasons:

• Much like the Arkansas-Pine Bluff Golden Lions, it can’t be easy to play your first home game right around Christmas. Add to that a season-opening road trip that includes contests against Arizona State, Washington State, Oklahoma, Arizona, Georgia, Iowa State, Kentucky, and Houston, and MSVU’s players probably feel like they’re stuck in a cement mixer that’s driving down the interstate between games at 110 mph.
  
  
• That cement mixer-o-destruction stops in Omaha tonight, between pit stops in Ames, Iowa, and Lexington, Kentucky. The Delta Devils will be staring eye to eye with a bench full of jacked up Jays, eager to get back to their winning ways. Dana Altman and his team are in the midst of a two-game losing streak, falling on the road by two points to both Arkansas-Little Rock and Nebraska. P’Allen Stinnett is going to play, which should make for a fired up dynamic for both the sophomore guard and whoever has to try and guard him.
  
  
• The Delta Devils are overmatched physically and depth-wise by Altman’s squad. MVSU features three players who log more than 30 minutes per game on average. These three, Shannon Behling (14 points), Eric Petty (10 points), and Dwayne Harmason (10 points) are also the Delta Devil leading scorers. None of Altman’s players average more than 27 minutes per game, and 11 of the Jays average more than 10 minutes of play.
  

The Jays will win. There is no option. They must win, and they must take a week’s worth of frustration out on MVSU. It should be brutal, but anything else will be a disappointment.

Enough of this nonsense. To the picks!

(Dance Cam Guy, Panon, my wife, and I will pick ‘em each and every game on this site. We’ll keep track of the winner each game, and at the end of the year you’ll be able to find one of us three buying a round or two of expensive Scottrade Center brews at Arch Madness.)

Leading Scorer

Creighton Otter: Chad Millard (14)
Dance Cam Guy: Justin Carter (19)
Panon: Booker Woodfox (18)
Mrs. Creighton Otter: Kenny Lawson (13)

Margin

Creighton Otter: Jays by 36
Dance Cam Guy: Jays by 26
Panon: Jays by 23
Mrs. Creighton Otter: Jays by 11