Memphis Tigers (20-8) vs. East Carolina Pirates (14-13)
February 29, 2024 7:00 pm EDT
The Line: East Carolina Pirates +4; Over/Under: 145.5
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The Memphis Tigers and the East Carolina Pirates meet Thursday in college basketball action from Minges Coliseum. Memphis is currently 20-8 overall following a win over Florida Atlantic. As for East Carolina, they’re coming off a loss to Rice that dropped the Pirates to 14-13 so far. Let’s get into our Memphis vs. East Carolina prediction. Check back all season long for free college basketball picks at Sports Chat Place.
Memphis Tigers
The Tigers got off to a nice start this year at 15-2, but then hit a losing streak versus South Florida, Tulane, UAB and Rice. Memphis is 5-2 in their last seven games though, beating Wichita State, Temple, Tulane, Charlotte and Florida Atlantic with losses to North Texas and SMU otherwise.
In the Florida Atlantic matchup on Sunday, the Tigers came out of the break with a 31-30 deficit. Memphis got better in the second half on a 48-43 run and powered out the win 78-74 in the end. Leading team scorer David Jones put up 25 points with 11 rebounds and three steals.
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East Carolina Pirates
Over on the East Carolina side, they were just 9-10 back on January 20 after a loss to UAB. The Pirates have improved in their last eight games on a 5-3 run featuring wins over Wichita State (twice), Temple, UTSA and Tulane. The three losses came versus South Florida, Charlotte and Rice.
Back on Saturday versus Rice, the Pirates were able to hang around in the first half with a 29-27 deficit. East Carolina faded from there however and ended up falling 70-52 after a 41-25 run. RJ Felton was the top team scorer on 15 points with six rebounds and a pair of steals.
ANDREW’S FREE MEMPHIS VS EAST CAROLINA PREDICTION
I’ll stay with Memphis. The Tigers have just one comfortable win in the last four games, but this is a good opportunity to get another one. In their latest outing Memphis started pretty slowly. The Tigers eventually shot 43.7 percent from the field though, and scored 18 points off 13 Owls turnovers. That makes 76 or more points in three straight games.
As for East Carolina, they’d been playing pretty well in the three outings before the Rice loss on Saturday. The Pirates had hit 68 or more points in each of those games and they’ll probably get a good lift from playing at home here. That said, East Carolina probably doesn’t have the gas to keep up with Memphis if the Tigers are playing well.
