#662 ASA FREE PLAY ON East Tennessee State -5 over Mercer, Wednesday at 7 PM ET - Mercer has played 6 straight home games, winning their last 5 and they are overvalued right now in our opinion because of that. They have not played a road game in over a month and they are 1-3 on the road with their only win coming by 5 points @ Chicago State who is currently ranked 312th nationally. Mercer has a 7-6 record and not a single win over anyone ranked higher than 220th. ETSU has played the much tougher schedule (SOS ranked 100 spots higher than Mercer) and they still have the better record despite that. The Buccaneers have 3 wins over teams ranked inside the top 200 and they are undefeated at home this season including a win over a very solid Davidson team (ranked 118th). The Bucs are playing their best basketball right now winning 5 of their last 6 including 2 impressive road wins during that stretch @ East Carolina and @ Jacksonville State, both better than any win Mercer has this season. ETSU has struggled at times offensively but they will be facing a bad Mercer defense here ranked outside the top 310 in both eFG% defense and 3 point FG% defense. The Bucs have faced 3 teams this season ranked outside the top 300 in defensive efficiency and in those games they’ve averaged 77 PPG so they should be fine here vs Mercer. ETSU is the much better defensive team in this matchup and they will be the 5th highest rated team Mercer has played this season. The Bears lost the 4 games vs teams inside the top 200 and they add another “L” here. Lay it with East Tennessee State.