Portland Pilots (9-15) vs. Gonzaga Bulldogs (16-6)
February 7, 2024 8:00 pm EDT
The Line: Gonzaga Bulldogs -27; Over/Under: 159
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The Portland Pilots and the Gonzaga Bulldogs meet Wednesday in college basketball action from McCarthey Athletic Center. Portland beat Pepperdine in their last outing, improving to 9-15 overall. As for Gonzaga, they’re sitting at 16-6 this year after a loss to Saint Mary’s on Saturday. Let’s get into our Portland vs. Gonzaga prediction. Check back all season long for free college basketball picks at Sports Chat Place.
Portland Pilots
The Pilots started out the year pretty well, but then went roughly two and a half months without winning consecutive games. Portland is 2-6 in their last eight with losses to Saint Mary’s, San Francisco, Santa Clara, San Diego, LMU and San Francisco again before wins over Pacific and Pepperdine.
In the Pepperdine game on Saturday, the Pilots jumped out to a nice 52-41 edge by the break. Portland was outscored 48-41 from there but still held on for the victory 93-89 in the end. Tyler Robertson was the team’s leading scorer on 24 points, seven rebounds and five assists.
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Gonzaga Bulldogs
Over on the Gonzaga side, they started the year at 11-5 with losses to Purdue, Washington, UConn, San Diego State and Santa Clara. After wins over Pepperdine, San Diego, San Francisco, Pacific and Loyola Marymount the Bulldogs took another loss to Saint Mary’s.
Matched up against Saint Mary’s on Saturday, the Bulldogs had a slim one-point lead going into the second half. Gonzaga was outscored 31-28 the rest of the way in a tough loss 64-62. Tops in scoring was Ryan Nembhard with 18 points, while Anton Watson doubled on 16 points and 10 boards.
ANDREW’S FREE PORTLAND VS GONZAGA PREDICTION
I’ll stay with Gonzaga. The line’s probably too thick to mess with, though. The Bulldogs need a return to form after falling in a tough one to Saint Mary’s over the weekend, and this is a good spot to get it. Gonzaga shot a rough 21.4 percent from 3-point range (21.4 percent) in their latest defeat but otherwise didn’t play too badly outside of surrendering 45.5 percent from the field on defense. It was the first time the Bulldogs had been below 74 points in 11 games.
As for Portland, they’ve got a couple of consecutive wins in the bag and should be feeling pretty good right now. This is going to be a tough matchup though, and with a talented Gonzaga team coming off a loss I don’t think the Pilots will hang around for too long.
