Cincinnati Bearcats vs West Virginia Mountaineers Betting Odds

Opening Line: Cincinnati +9 / West Virginia -9 O/U 128.5

Time: 9 PM EST Thursday March 11, 2010

Tonight in the quarterfinals of the Big East conference the 6th ranked West Virginia Mountaineers face the Cincinnati Bearcats. Cincy got over their 1st hurdle in beating Louisville last night, but they are still on the bubble, as this is, pretty much, a must win game for them if they want to get in the Big Dance. WVU is in the NCAA tournament regardless of the outcome of this game, but if they can win the conference tournament they will likely get a top seed in the tourney.

This season WVU is 13-16 ATS and Cincinnati is 8-18-1 ATS.

Last night Cincinnati beat Louisville 69-66 and WVU got a bye into the quarterfinals and are coming into this game with some steam beating 10th ranked Villanova in their last game, which was their 3rd win in a row.

The Bearcats have won 2 straight games in the Big East tournament, but they lost 7 of their last 9 regular season games.

In their one meeting this season WVU beat Cincy at home 74-68 at the end of last month.

Cincinnati had made the Big Dance 14 straight years under current WVU coach Bob Huggins, but has not made it since he left in 2005.

WVU has a great frontcourt with 3 forwards averaging in double figures led by Da'Sean Butler (17.2 ppg) and all 3 average at least 6.3 rpg.

Unlike the Mountaineers the Bearcats are led by their backcourt with 2 guards averaging in double figures led by Big East Freshman of the Year Lance Stephenson (12 ppg).

Even though the Bearcats have better guard play they may have to win the battle of the boards to win this game. That will be far from easy since WVU has such a solid frontcourt.

In last night's win over Louisville Cincinnati out-rebounded the Cardinals 54-33, but in their loss to WVU in the end of February WVU out-rebounded the Bearcats 41-30.

This game is being held at Madison Square Garden in New York City and even though neither of these schools is close to the Big Apple all 5 starters for WVU are from the New York City area.

WVU is 5-2 ATS in their last 7 games following a win and has an Under record of 9-2 in their last 11 games following an ATS win.

Cincinnati is 4-9 ATS in their last 13 games following a win, 0-5 ATS in their last 5 games following a ATS win, and has an Under record of 6-1 in their last 7 games held at a neutral site.

Cincinnati is 4-1-1 ATS in their last 6 games against WVU.

Our Selection : we're going to take a shot on the Bearcats in this game. Sure, they will be playing their third game in three days, but confidence and motivation is on their side. They've played well this season on neutral courts losing only one of 5 games. The only loss was in overtime to Zaga with with quality wins versus Maryland, Venderbilt and Louisville. These two teams did meet on Feb 27th in West Virginia with the Mountaineers pulling out a narrow 74-68 win. The linesmaker at Betus has opened this game at West Virginia -9. We think that Cincinnati will have enough left in the tank to keep this game close. Take the Bearcats +9