It’s still another five years before the Backyard Brawl will return to the gridiron, but there is still a lot of animosity between the fanbases of the Pittsburgh Panthers and the West Virginia Mountaineers. Since college basketball has a lot more flexibility with its scheduling, these rival universities will get to square off on the hardwood in the meantime and will face each other for the first time since 2012 on Saturday.
This war on the floor will go down Saturday, December 9, 2017, at 8 p.m. ET at the Petersen Events Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The game will be televised live on ESPN2. We'll have NCAA basketball odds at BookMaker.eu available for this and every game on the college basketball Saturday schedule.
Opening College Basketball Odds at BookMaker.eu
Pittsburgh is having a little bit of buyer’s remorse about hiring Kevin Stallings. Stallings was in danger of being fired by Vanderbilt after the 2016 season, but the Panthers felt like he was the man for the job after Jamie Dixon left for TCU. He posted the first losing season in 17 years at Pitt last year and things are off to a rocky start this season too.
The Panthers are 5-4 on the year and have yet to beat a quality opponent. Pittsburgh lost to Navy and Montana in its first two games and then got hammered by Penn State. Pitt may have won four straight coming into this game, but the only decent opponent they played was Duquesne and they also needed overtime to get past Mount St. Mary’s.
West Virginia is riding high right now. The Mountaineers lost their season opener against Texas A&M but have won eight straight since that point and beat some very good teams in that timeframe. WVU hammered a solid UCF team and an up and got by an up and coming Missouri team in the Advocare Invitational. It’s best win came earlier this week though when they knocked off a previously undefeated Virginia squad.
Player to Watch
Jevon Carter is looking like an All-American again in his senior season. Carter is leading the team in a slew of categories and is the heart and soul of the Mountaineers. He has been the Mountaineers’ hot hand during their run and has shown how his shooting has got progressively better since he first stepped foot in Morgantown.
Carter is hitting 45.2 percent of his field goals, the best number of his career, and had his best performance of the season against Virginia’s pressure defense on Tuesday. He finished that game with 23 points on 50 percent shooting and got to the line nine times too. Additionally, he pulled down 10 rebounds and doled out seven assists in the win.
Where Carter is the best though is on the defensive end. He has lightning quick reflexes and is great at swiping the ball from his opponents. Carter leads the nation in steals by a large margin, averaging 4.2 SPG. Pittsburgh’s guards better watch out when he is matched up against them.
Key Stat
Despite playing more than a few cupcakes, Pittsburgh has one of the worst offenses for a power conference team. The Panthers are averaging just 71.1 PPG and are outside of the top 100 in every major offensive category too.
There are some bright spots though. Ryan Luther is averaging almost 10 rebounds per game in his senior year and Marcus Carr is one of the best free throw shooters in the country. Still, this team doesn’t have the dynamic playmakers it once did.
Free College Basketball ATS Picks
Even though this game is being played in Pittsburgh, don’t be surprised if there is a very pro-WVU crowd. The Stallings era has sucked the life out of the Pitt fanbase and barely 2,000 people showed up for its last home game.
Pittsburgh’s four primary starters are all averaging two or more turnovers per game and West Virginia cannot wait to attack this team with its pressure defense. Expect the Mountaineers to roll.
College Basketball Odds: West Virginia 84, Pittsburgh 67
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