Bowling Green vs. Miami OH

Five games separate the Miami OH RedHawks from a perfect regular season. The lone undefeated team in the nation will look to ace another exam against Bowling Green on Friday night. We’ve already seen one Bowling Green vs. Miami OH game this season and it was a 10-point win in northwest Ohio for the men of Oxford back on Dec. 30. That was just the second conference game for both teams. Miami is 13-0. Bowling Green is 7-7.

This is not the biggest remaining favorite role for Miami OH, as they project to be favored by more at Western Michigan next Friday and potentially by even more at home against Toledo on Mar. 3. Even with a truncated field for the MAC Tournament in Cleveland, as only eight of the 13 conference members qualify, Bowling Green is safely in. But, they’d sure love to get the type of win here that would put the rest of the conference on notice.

Also, we should consider how much things have changed between these two teams. When they played on Dec. 30, Bowling Green closed -6.5 and took heavy action from an opening line of -3.5 because it was Miami’s first game without Evan Ipsaro, who hasn’t played since after averaging 13.9 PPG and 3.3 APG over the first 12 games of the season.

This preview focuses solely on this game, but we’ve got daily best bets from Greg Peterson, as well as his daily spread and total projections, picks six days a week from Adam Burke, and men’s and women’s college basketball projections five days a week from Tyler Shoemaker, the proprietor of the T Shoe Index.

This season, we’ve also connected with CBBAnalytics.com to access their data and I’ll be working that into my article. Use promo code VSIN30 for $30 off at CBB Analytics and find your betting edge.

Odds from DraftKings Sportsbook as of February 19, 6:30 pm PT; check out our Circa Betting Splits and DraftKings Betting Splits.

Bowling Green vs. Miami OH (-7.5, 152.5)

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8:30 p.m. ET (CBS Sports Network)

It turns out that network executives notice when you’re doing something special. The 8:30 p.m. ET start time is a weird one for these two teams, but to accommodate the CBS Sports Network broadcast crew, that’s when this game will tip off. That just gives the home fans more time to get a little lubed up for the second-to-last home game of the season.

After several close calls in short order, Miami hasn’t broken much of a sweat lately. The RedHawks won back-to-back overtime games against Buffalo and Kent State on Jan. 17 and 20 and then beat UMass by just two points on Jan. 27. They’ve won four of their last five games by nine or more points, including wins by 24, 16, and 16. They did narrowly escape Buffalo again on Feb. 3 with a two-point road win, but their last three games have been comfortable triumphs.

Bowling Green has been the epitome of up and down. After a 10-3 start to the season, including a very impressive road win over Kansas State, the Falcons haven’t won more than two games in a row in 2026. They were just 4-of-19 from 3 against Kent State on Tuesday, a disappointing performance after beating archrival Toledo at home on Valentine’s Day.

A 10-point difference in the final score of the first game is a bit misleading. Miami led by 26 points at halftime and 22 points with about 13 minutes to play before emptying the bench. Eight different players saw at least 12 minutes of action in that one, as the RedHawks were 11-of-23 from 3 compared to just 5-of-22 for the Falcons. It should be noted, though, that Bowling Green was 19-of-27 at the rim and did find success getting inside, even if they couldn’t stop Miami on the perimeter well enough to keep pace.

Miami actually had 16 turnovers in that game, which was played to 76 possessions. Bowling Green had 13 and won the battle on the offensive glass, but the RedHawks’ hot start was simply too much to overcome. That game was sort of the coming-out party for Luke Skaljac, who took on major minutes and a much larger workload when Ipsaro got hurt. Skaljac had 15 points and five assists in that game.

Now, Skaljac is one of six RedHawks averaging double figures, with five of them active since Ipsaro has the torn ACL. Miami’s top three active scorers are shooting 56.5%, 50.4%, and 57.1% from the floor. By eFG% offense, this is the third-best team in the nation per Torvik. They are shooting better than 62% on 2s and over 38% on 3s for the season as a whole, and 63.9% and 37.4%, respectively, in conference play.

Bowling Green has four players in double figures nightly, paced by Javontae Campbell with 18.6 PPG. He’s also the team’s leading assist man with five dimes per game, but he’s only shooting 31.6% from 3. The Falcons don’t have the same perimeter shooters that the RedHawks have, a big reason why the first game was so lopsided. However, Bowling Green is one of the conference’s best defensive rebounding teams and actually ranks second in adjusted defensive efficiency, while Miami is fifth.

Bowling Green vs. Miami OH Prediction

Campbell and Seth Towns will get theirs for Bowling Green here, but Mayar Wol (11.1 PPG) and Josiah Shackelford (11.5 PPG) are really struggling. Those two, along with Javon Ruffin, are the best 3-point shooters that see the floor a lot. Wol has been held under five points in four of the last six games – he had 14 against Miami in the first meeting. Shackelford is 3-for-18 on 2s over his last two games and 4-of-14 from 3 in his last four games. I don’t think Bowling Green will get the necessary secondary scoring to keep pace in this one, as Miami moves one game closer to history with a win and cover.

Pick: Miami OH -7.5

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