The Portland Pilots and the BYU Cougars meet Thursday in college basketball action from Marriott Center. 

Portland enters this one at 6-7 overall. The Pilots are riding a five-game losing streak and fell to Pepperdine in their last outing. As for BYU, they’re sitting at 11-3 this year. The Cougars have won their last two games versus Saint Mary’s and San Francisco. Check back all season long for free college baseball picks at Sports Chat Place. 

Portland began their year with a loss but then rattled off wins in their next five outings. The Pilots lost to Oregon, beat Montana State and have lost each of their last five. Those defeats have come courtesy of Seattle, San Francisco, Gonzaga, San Francisco again and Pepperdine. 

In the 80-65 loss to the Waves on Saturday, Portland’s Eddie Davis put up 19 points with eight rebounds and two assists. Latrell Jones added 15 points with six boards and one assist, and Mikey Henn chipped in 14 points, four rebounds and four assists in 33 minutes of action. 

Over on the BYU side, they opened up their season on a 5-1 run, with a loss to USC as the only blemish. The Cougars lost to Boise State then took out Utah, San Diego State, Texas Southern and Weber State before a loss to Gonzaga. Since then it’s been two wins over Saint Mary’s and San Francisco. 

In the Saturday win over the Dons 72-63, BYU’s top scorer was Alex Barcello with 19 points, two rebounds and one assist. Richard Harward doubled up for the Cougars on 13 points with 11 rebounds in 18 minutes, and Gideon George added 12 points with three rebounds. 

The Cougars are 33-16-2 ATS in their last 51 Thursday games and 23-11-1 ATS in their last 35 games overall. The over is 4-0 in BYU’s last four home games and the under is 5-1 in their last six Thursday games. 

Meanwhile, the Pilots are 0-4 ATS in their last four road games and 1-4 ATS in their last five games overall. Portland is 17-36 ATS in their last 53 Thursday games and the under is 8-3 in their last 11 after a straight-up loss. 

PICK: I’m sticking with BYU here. Portland hasn’t been scoring all that well lately. The Pilots have hit more than 68 points just once over their last seven games, and much of that was in garbage time during a blowout loss to Gonzaga. The Cougars have been playing quite consistently, and they’re getting good efforts from a lot of guys on the roster. This should be BYU’s cover to take.