Portland vs New Orleans 12/10/22 College Basketball Picks, Predictions, Odds

The New Orleans Privateers and the Portland Pilots meet Saturday in college basketball action from Chiles Center. New Orleans enters this matchup at 2-5 overall. The Privateers lost to Louisiana in their last game. As for Portland, they’re currently 7-5 on the season following a loss to North Dakota State. Check back all season long for free college basketball picks at Sports Chat Place.

New Orleans went just 1-3 over their first four games this year, falling to Butler, LSU and the Citadel (and a win over St. Francis IL). After a win over IUPUI, the Privateers took losses in the next pair to Denver and Louisiana. 

Last weekend versus Louisiana, the Privateers were down 33-32 going into the second half. New Orleans kept the pace from there but still took the loss 78-77. Jordan Johnson was the lead team scorer with 22 points.

Over on the Portland side, they one 4-1 over their first five games with wins over Lewis & Clark, Florida A&M, Portland State and Air Force. The Pilots went 3-4 over the next seven games with wins over only North Dakota, Multnomah and Villanova. 

On Monday versus North Dakota State, Portland took a four-point deficit into the break. The Pilots were outscored 39-38 from there and lost 67-62. Kristian Sjolund led the team on 19 points with four boards. 

PICK: I’m going to try New Orleans here. The Privateers have gone just 1-2 over their last three games but they’re scoring well. New Orleans has hit 76 or more points in each of those outings, and if they can keep up that trend things could get interesting cover-wise in this matchup. As for Portland, they didn’t look great against a struggling North Dakota State team and could use a bounce-back. The Pilots have scored well overall this year themselves, so I like this one to be a relatively high-scoring affair on both sides.