College Basketball on Wednesday and we will see the Depaul Blue Demons travel to South Bend, Indiana to take on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. The game is scheduled for a 7:00 pm (Eastern) start time and will be televised on the Big East Network. Currently the Odds for the game have Notre Dame favored by 11 points while the total sits at 149 .
Analysis: DePaul is enduring yet another dismal campaign in the Big East Conference, dragging a 1-9 league ledger into this contest, which has the team just a half game ahead of 1-10 South Florida for last place. The Blue Demons have lost eight straight since posting their lone conference win at Providence on Jan. 5, and the team is sporting an overall record of 10-13, although it is 4-4 in true road games. DePaul's most recent setback came against another ranked foe in Marquette last Saturday on the road, 89-78. The Blue Demons are surrendering a league-high 73.5 points this season, and allowing 82.4 points in league play. Villanova (94) scored its most points in a regulation game this season against DePaul while Marquette (89) matched its season high four days later. The Blue Demons’ pressure defense, which recorded at least 10 steals six times during non-conference play, has forced no more than six in any of the last four contests. For the season, Young and Cleveland Melvin are the club's only double-digit scorers, netting 16.6 and 16.3 ppg, respectively. DePaul has lost 38 in a row to ranked opponents, with its last such win coming against No. 16 Villanova on Jan. 3, 2008 and they are trying to avoid a nine-game losing streak for the fifth straight season.
Notre Dame is having a much different season, the team winning 19 of its first 24 bouts, including seven of 11 in Big East play. The Fighting Irish, who have won four of their last five, are within two games of first place in the conference standings, and they played an epic game this past Saturday against one of the teams they'll have to pass as they outlasted No. 11 Louisville in five overtimes, 104-101. It was the longest game in both UND and Big East regular-season history, and it improved the Irish to 8-2 in their last 10 extra-session affairs. Several guys played integral roles in last Saturday's marathon win over Louisville, a half dozen of which scored in double figures for a Notre Dame team that shot just 41.6 percent from the field, missing 18 of its 25 3-point tries along the way. The Irish did however, score 33 points at the free-throw line, and outscored the Cardinals in bench points, 39-31. Garrick Sherman was next in line with 17 points, but he did not log a single minute in the game until well into the first extra session, and he grabbed six boards as well. Cooley also had another double-double with his 11 points and 11 caroms. Cooley (14.6 ppg, 11.3 rpg), Grant (13.0 ppg, 5.6 apg) and Eric Atkins (11.8 ppg, 6.0 apg) lead UND in just about every statistical category this season, the team as a whole averaging 73.2 ppg while yielding 63.9 ppg.
Pick: Earlier when these teams met there was 150 points scored in that game, but it needed OT to get there. Notre Dame nearly lost that game because they played an uptempo game with the Blue Demons and that is not ND's style of play as he Irish are 327th in the nation in tempo and I feel that at home they will get this game more to their liking. Irish home games have averaged 137.8 ppg on the year and they play excellent defense at home as well. They have allowed 63.1 ppg at home, but remember that number does include the 101 points they allowed in the 5 OT game vs Louisville. That game only put up 120 points in regulation and ND's last 5 home games (Regulation) have averaged just 122.6 ppg, with their defense allowing just 62.8 ppg in those games (Reg), while just 2 of their last 10 Big East games have put more than 138 points and those two were because of OT. The Irish do not like to play in the 140's at all and I just don't see it here, at home. 140 points were scored in regulation in the first meeting, but I expect this one to come in just under that number.
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