The Portland Pilots and the Hawaii Rainbow Warriors meet Thursday in college basketball action from Stan Sheriff Center. Portland is currently .500 through 12 games and coming off a loss to Grand Canyon on Saturday. As for Hawaii, they’re sitting at 7-2 on the season following a loss to Nevada. Let’s get into our Portland vs. Hawaii prediction. Check back all season long for free college basketball picks at Sports Chat Place.

Portland Pilots 

The Pilots started out on a nice 3-0 clip this year, but then quickly hit the skids on a 3-6 run in the next nine outings. Portland beat Willamette, Wyoming and North Dakota in that time but otherwise fell to Tennessee State, Nevada, Portland State, Air Force, North Dakota State and Grand Canyon. 

In the loss to Grand Canyon on Saturday, the Pilots were pretty overwhelmed for the whole game. Portland was down 41-28 by halftime and limped to a 91-63 result by giving 50 more points from there in a 91-63 blowout. Leading team scorer Tyler Robertson put up 17 points with two rebounds in the losing effort. 

Hawaii Rainbow Warriors 

Over on the Warriors’ side, they were able to win seven of their first eight games this year. Outside of a 79-66 loss to Utah, Hawaii toppled Hawaii Hilo, Niagara, Northern Arizona, TX Rio Grande Valley, San Diego, Central Arkansas and Hawaii Pacific in that stretch before another loss to Nevada. 

In their Sunday game versus Nevada, the Warriors were up 37-36 at the break. Hawaii was outscored 36-29 the rest of the way however and lost 72-66. Tops in scoring were Bernardo da Silva (10 rebounds) and Noel Coleman (four rebounds), each with 17 points. 

ANDREW’S FREE PORTLAND VS HAWAII PREDICTION 

I’ll probably stay with Hawaii in this one. The Warriors had a rough second half in their latest game versus a tough Nevada team and didn’t play particularly well overall. Hawaii put up a tepid 40.4 percent from the field in the loss and hit just three of their 17 tries from 3-point range (17.6 percent). Prior to that the Warriors had put up 70 or more points in seven of eight games however, so they’ve got a good chance at bouncing back on Thursday. 

As for Portland, they’ve been at 67 points or fewer in three of the last four games, going 1-3 in that time. The Pilots are capable of scoring well this year in the right matchups, but I don’t think they’ll quite stretch out a cover in this game.