Loyola Marymount vs San Francisco College Basketball Picks, Odds, Predictions 3/5/21

The San Francisco Dons and the Loyola Marymount Lions meet Friday in college basketball action from Orleans Arena. 

Coming into this West Coast Tournament matchup, San Francisco is 11-13 so far. The Dons beat San Diego in the tournament on Thursday. As for LMU, they’re sitting at 12-8 this year. The Lions are 1-2 in their last three games and coming off a loss to Gonzaga. Check back all season long for free college basketball picks at Sports Chat Place. 

San Francisco hasn’t been able to sustain winning streaks this year, but they crawled to a 10-7 record on January 21. After that, the Dons hit a six-game losing streak that was halted by the Thursday tournament win over San Diego. 

In Thursday’s win 67-51 over San Diego, San Francisco jumped out to a 30-17 lead at the break and didn’t let up. Leading the team in scoring was Jamaree Bouyea with 18 points, six rebounds and six assists. 

Over on the LMU side, they hung around the .500 mark for most of the early part of the year, but then hit a four-game win streak in late January/early February. Since then the Lions are just 1-2 however, beating Pepperdine while otherwise falling to BYU and Gonzaga. 

In the 86-69 loss to Gonzaga, LMU’s Eli Scott put up 20 points with 11 rebounds and three assists. Mattias Markusson also doubled up with 19 points and 10 boards, while Ivan Alipiev put up 11 points with four rebounds and three assists. 

LMU is 1-4 ATS in their last five Friday games and 6-1 ATS in their last seven overall. The over is 5-1 in the Lions’ last six overall and 4-1 in their last five after an ATS win. 

Meanwhile, the Dons are 4-1 ATS in their last five Friday games and 2-5 ATS in their last seven overall. San Francisco is 7-3 ATS in their last 10 neutral-site games and the under is 11-5 in their last 16 overall.

PICK: I’m going to stick with LMU in this one. The Lions have hit a couple of tough matchups in their last trio of outings, but generally they’ve been scoring well lately. Loyola Marymount has hit 68 or more points in each of their last eight outings, and they’ve been competitive most times they hit the floor. This should be an interesting matchup but I like LMU a little better on a potential cover/win.