As if gamblers didn’t already have their hands full with a huge weekend in the NBA, NFL and college football. Now bettors have college basketball to tackle with huge cards on tap for Saturday and Sunday.

The best game on Saturday will be Creighton at Dayton. Las Vegas Sports Consultants opened the Flyers as three-point home favorites. However, as of Friday night, most books had Dayton favored by seven.

Credit Dana Altman for having the (Bill Raftery voice) onions to go on the road and face a top-tier foe in his squad’s season opener. The task of winning for the Bluejays was already going to be formidable, but the anticipated absences of three players, including starting guard Justin Carter, who averaged 8.1 points and 5.5 rebounds per game in 2008-2009.

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Chad Millard (foot) and Casey Harriman (virus) are also “out.”

Dayton has won 20 consecutive home games. The Flyers are ranked in the Top 25 of nearly every poll and publication you can get your hands on. They have four starters returning from a team that beat West Virginia in the first round of the NCAA Tournament before falling against Kansas in the second round.

Brian Gregory’s team is gunning for its third straight trip to the Big Dance. All of the ingredients are in place to make that happen. Most importantly, the Flyers have a senior point guard that gets after it defensively and takes care of the basketball on the other end. His name is London Warren.

Chris Wright leads a balanced scoring attack, averaging 13.3 points and 6.6 rebounds per game last season. He torched the Mountaineers with 27 points and 10 rebounds last March. Gregory thinks he has one of the country’s premier players in Wright, telling the Associated Press, "He does some things better than anybody in the country. No one plays as hard. No one finishes on the break better. No one goes to the offensive glass better. Those traits make him unique."

Creighton has won at least 20 games in 11 consecutive seasons. The Bluejays return three starters from last season’s 27-8 squad that lost to Kentucky in the second round of the NIT.

These teams met last year with Creighton putting an end to Dayton’s 8-0 start by virtue of a 77-59 home win on Jan. 6. Unlike his dominant performance against WVU, Wright was limited to eight points and eight boards in the loss to the Bluejays.

The Anthony Grant Era at Alabama begins Saturday at 2:00 p.m. Eastern when the Crimson Tide play host to Cornell. LVSC opened ‘Bama as a 10-point home ‘chalk’ but the number was seven at most spots late Friday night.

Watch out for a potential upset here. The Big Red has a senior-laden team with all five starters returning, including Louis Dale, the Ivy League Player of the Year in 2007-2008. Ryan Wittman, the son of Randy who had one of the best catch-and-shoot jumpers in college basketball history during his career with Bobby Knight at Indiana, is the Ivy’s leading returning scorer after pouring in 18.5 PPG last year.

On Sunday, Washington will play host to Portland St. The Huskies have two of the Pac-10’s premier players in sophomore point guard Isaiah Thomas and senior forward Quincy Pondexter. In addition, Lorenzo Romar brought in one of the nation’s elite recruits in guard Abdul Gaddy.

Remember, Portland St. pulled an upset at Gonzaga last December and has been to back-to-back NCAA Tournaments. But the Vikings lost head coach Ken Bone to Washington State, as top assistant Tyler Geving takes over. Geving has three starters back, including a pair of double-figure scorers in Dominic Waters (11.4 PPG) and Phil Nelson (10.8 PPG).

The Vikings might be worth a look if they’re catching a healthy double-digit number.

**B.E.’s Bonus Nuggets**

--Although Kentucky prevailed over Morehead State by a 75-59 count in John Calipari’s regular-season debut Friday night at Rupp Arena, it failed to cover the number as 18-point home favorites. Freshman sensation John Wall did not play, but Xavier Henry (27 points) and Eric Bledsoe (24 pts.) sure did.

-Georgia won its opener Friday in new head coach Mark Fox’s debut at Stegeman Coliseum. However, New Orleans took the cash as a 16-point underdog in the 67-59 defeat.

--Mississippi State’s home opener was an absolute atrocity. The Bulldogs fell victim to a big-time upset by Rider, which won at The Hump by an 88-74 score as a 15 ½-point road underdog. Renardo Sidney did not play and might not anytime soon. Here’s the latest on Sidney from Kyle Veazey.

Brian Edwards can be reached at briane@vegasinsider.com.

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