The West Virginia Mountaineers travel to Pittsburgh tonight to take on the slumping Pitt Panthers at 9:00pm ET.  The line came out at WVU -2.5 and was nudged up to -3.  WVU is coming off a loss earlier this week at home to no. 2 Villanova. Nova was getting 5 points in that contest and won straight up.  Pitt is coming off two straight wins, beating Seton hall and Robert Morris respectively.

WVU is currently ranked no. 5 in the country with a 19-4 overall record (8-3 in the conf.) and Pitt is hanging in at no. 25 with a 18-6 overall record (7-4 conf.)  Aston Gibbs is coming off a 20 point game for Pitt and Darryl Bryant was WVU's top scorer in the last game with 15 pts.  These two teams match up well and we see a tight contest.  This rivalry is referred to as  "The backyard Brawl" because of the close proximity of the schools to one another, plus the fact that they are in the same conference and run into each other quite a great deal. 

The over/under is quite low at 128.5. We are going to stay away from the total and concentrate on the side for this contest.  We like Pitt to cover the spread and quite possibly win this one outright.


Current streak:
Pittsburgh has won 2 straight games.

Team records:
West Virginia: 19-4 SU, 9-13 ATS
Pittsburgh: 18-6 SU, 11-8-2 ATS

West Virginia most recently:
When playing on Friday are 5-5
Before playing Providence are 5-5
After playing Villanova are 6-4
After a loss are 8-2

Pittsburgh most recently:
When playing on Friday are 8-2
Before playing Marquette are 8-1
After playing Robert Morris are 8-1
After a win are 8-2

A few trends to consider:
West Virginia is 6-1 SU in its last 7 games
The total has gone UNDER in 4 of West Virginia's last 5 games when playing on the road against Pittsburgh
West Virginia is 6-2 SU in its last 8 games on the road
The total has gone UNDER in 8 of West Virginia's last 11 games when playing Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh is 14-1 SU in its last 15 games at home
Pittsburgh is 4-1 SU in its last 5 games when playing at home against West Virginia
The total has gone UNDER in 4 of Pittsburgh's last 5 games when playing at home against West Virginia
Pittsburgh is 18-6 SU in its last 24 games

Next up:
West Virginia at Providence, Wednesday, February 17
Pittsburgh at Marquette, Thursday, February 18

Stats by Bodog