The Cal State Northridge Matadors and the UC Riverside Highlanders meet Saturday in college basketball action from UC Riverside Student Recreation Center. CSU Northridge is fresh off a Thursday matchup versus Long Beach State. In that one the Matadors lost by 10 points. As for UC Riverside, they played CSU Fullerton in their last outing. The Highlanders ended up falling by 15 points. Check back all season long for free college basketball picks at Sports Chat Place.
CSU Northridge went just 2-8 over their first 10 outings this year, beating only La Sierra and Whittier Athletics along the way. The Matadors would then beat San Diego and lose to Cal Poly and CSU Fullerton.
On Thursday versus Long Beach State, the Matadors took a 41-31 deficit into the second half. UC Riverside didn’t get any closer and lost 84-74. Dionte Bostick put up 22 points, and Fidelis Okereke doubled on 10 points and 12 boards.
Over on the UC Riverside side, they were 6-4 overall through 10 games with losses to Colorado, Creighton, Cal Baptist and Oregon. The Highlanders took a loss to San Diego then beat Portland, CSU Bakersfield and Long Beach State in the next four outings.
Matched up against CSU Fullerton, the Highlanders were beaten up on a 44-28 deficit in the first half. UC Riverside got better in the second but ended up losing 77-62. Jhaylon Martinez led the way on 13 points with seven rebounds.
PICK: I’ll probably stay with UC Riverside. The Highlanders didn’t play especially well against CSU Fullerton in their last outing, but they’d had a pretty good run prior to that. UC Riverside had managed 72 or more points in five of their previous six games, so the 62 points was quite the disappointment scoring-wise. As for CSU Northridge, they’ve been all over the place on the scoreboard lately but should be competitive here for the most part. Ultimately I like UC Riverside to power out a cover, though.