The Utah Utes want to know what they have to do to start getting some respect. They're 17-5, have won five games in a row and have covered their last four. A tricky week on the road is ahead in Oregon, but this game against the Oregon State Beavers is clearly the easier of the two duels.
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HOW THE UTAH UTES CAN COVER THE SPREAD
One only needs to look at what Jakob Poeltl has done in these last few games to understand why the Utes are dominating. Against Washington, Cal and Stanford, the Austrian 7-footer came up with a total of 73 points and 26 rebounds, and if that's what he's going to do in this game against Oregon State, the Beavers may as well not even bother showing up.
Quietly, Utah has turned into one of the most efficient inside teams in the nation. This isn't a particularly great three-point shooting team, but with Poeltl dominating in the paint, the Utes rank No. 19 in the land in shooting percentage and No. 21 in rebounding differential.
If the Beavers are spraying shots all over the place and leaving a ton of rebounding chances, you can bet that the bigs are going to clean up. Not only can Poeltl be a double-double threat, but so too could Kyle Kuzma, who has put together three straight games of scoring in double figures.
HOW THE OREGON STATE BEAVERS CAN COVER THE SPREAD
Oregon State actually led by 10 points at Utah a few weeks ago with less than 10 minutes remaining in the game. From there though, all of the common problems we've seen out of the Beavers cropped up.
They went incredibly cold from the field, and after allowing just two offensive rebounds in the first 30 minutes of the game, they allowed six in the final 10 minutes, giving the Utes a ton of opportunities to tally second-chance points.
Interestingly enough, Jarmal Reid was booted out of that Utah game for tripping a ref, and he's expected back for this game from his suspension. He'll have to be effective in the paint as a reserve big man.
Of course, Gary Payton II could always take the game over as well. The son of "The Glove" had 22 points, 15 boards, eight assists and four steals against USC a few games ago, and he was the reason why the Beavs won 85-70 as two-point dogs. Since that point, he's managed a total of just 11 points through two games, and not surprisingly, OSU failed to reach 70 points in both games.
ANALYSIS AND ODDS PREDICTION
It's almost like Utah figured it out against Oregon State over the course of the second part of the second half, and we wonder if that's going to boil over into this one as well.
Reid tripping the ref seemed to be a turning point in the NCAAB season for the Beavers in a bad way, and we think they're set to get run out of dodge in this one at home. Utah has been playing far too well, and just as Reid and the Beavers were frustrated after bodying up with one of the best frontcourts in the nation, we think we're going to see a similar result play out on Thursday night.
Utah 72, Oregon State 63
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