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The No. 2 and No. 3 teams in the West Coast Conference face off on Thursday, Feb. 12, at 9 p.m. ET on ESPN2, as the St. Mary’s Gaels travel to Marriot Center to face the BYU Cougars.
St. Mary’s struggled early in the season, dropping three non-conference games to the St. John’s Red Storm, Boise State Broncos and Northern Arizona Lumberjacks. With just two losses in conference play and an overall record of 18-5, the Gaels are considered an NCAA tournament team, but due to the overall strength of their conference, they will likely need to win most of their final games to sneak in.
The Cougars, on the other hand, need to defeat St. Mary’s. Their 18-8 record looks promising, but with two bad losses to Pepperdine, BYU isn’t a lock for the Big Dance just yet. It would be a shame if the Cougars were left out of the 2015 NCAA tournament, but we’ve seen it happen to talented teams before.
With the game being at Marriot Center, BYU looks to be the team with the upper hand. St. Mary’s will be able to keep this one close, but the Cougars lead the nation in points per game and are unlikely to score less than 70 at home. If the Gaels are to win, they will need to contain BYU’s offense while exploiting the Cougars’ questionable defense.
Look for Kyle Collinsworth to get close to another triple-double and Tyler Haws to score 20 or more points, but the real key to this game will be the team stepping up on defense and limiting St. Mary’s to under 70 points.
Prediction: BYU 76, St. Mary’s 68
Taylor Sturm is a Featured Basketball Writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @TSturmRS, like him on Facebook or add him to your network on Google.
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