San Francisco vs BYU 3/5/22 College Basketball Picks, Predictions, Odds

The BYU Cougars and the San Francisco Dons meet in college basketball action from the Orleans Arena on Saturday night.

The BYU Cougars come into this one off of their 85-60 second round win over Loyola Marymount last time out. Alex Barcello leads the Cougars with 17.2 PPG while Fousseyni Traore has a team-high 8.4 RPG to lead the Cougars on the glass and Te’Jon Lucas has 10.7 PPG with a team-high 4.7 APG to lead the Cougars in the assist department and to make up the other half of the pair of double-digit scorers for BYU so far this season. As a team, BYU is averaging 73.7 PPG on 45.2% shooting from the field, 36.1% from three and 72.9% from the foul line while allowing 67.9 PPG on 42% shooting from the field and 30.8% from three this season.

The San Francisco Dons come into this one as the #4 seed in the conference tournament, finishing the year 23-8 overall including 10-6 in conference play. Jamaree Bouyea leads the Dons in scoring and assists with 17 PPG and 4.1 APG while Yauhen Massalski leads the Dons on the glass with 9.4 RPG along with 13.6 PPG and Khalil Shabazz has 13.4 PPG for San Francisco to cap off the group of double-digit scorers for the Dons so far this season. As a team, San Francisco is averaging 77.3 PPG on 46% shooting from the field, 35.5% from three and 69.9% from the foul line while allowing 66.7 PPG on 42.1% shooting from the field and 30.1% from three this season.

I get the case to be made either way in this spot, but I’m looking BYU’s way here. The Dons have the rest advantage by a decent margin, but the Cougars playing on a back-to-back may serve them well here as they have a chance to roll over their momentum that they built up in the win over LMU. I’ll side with BYU in this one.