Pittsburgh (22-6)
-4, o/u 132
vs. Louisville (18-11), 9:20 p.m. Eastern, ESPN
The Pittsburgh Panthers and the Louisville Cardinals meet tonight in a Big East Conference tournament first-round match-up at Madison Square Garden.
Pitt is in as far as the NCAA championship tournament is concerned. But Louisville will probably have to win the Big East tournament to get a chance to repeat it's success of last season, when the Cardinals reached the Final Four.
Pitt lost three of its last four games in the regular season. Shockingly, the Panthers fell as 11-point home favorites to Seton Hall 65-61 Friday, hitting just 11 of 21 free throws. That loss dropped the Panthers into a fourth-place tie with Georgetown and Marquette at 10-6 in the Big East, and into the sixth seed, playing a first-round game in the conference tournament.
Louisville, which finished in a tie with Notre Dame for 10th place in the conference at 6-10 and is the 11 seed in the conference tournament, is on an eight-game LWLWLWLW streak. The Cardinals lost at Connecticut 84-80 Saturday as 14-point road dogs.
Pittsburgh is 12-9 against the spread this season, 8-8 ats as chalk, 8-7 ats in Big East play.
Louisville is a pocket-picking 9-16 against the spread on the season, 3-5 ats as an underdog and 7-9 ats in the Big East.
Pitt won the only recent meeting between these two teams, 61-57 in January as three-point road dogs. At the time, Louisville was 13-2 and ranked near the Top 10. Since then, with the help of some bad luck, injuries and poor play late in games, the Cardinals have gone 5-8.
The Panthers started their season 15-0, but have gone just 6-6 since.
Pitt is shooting 46 percent from the floor this season, and ranks in the Top 10 in Division 1 with a +8.6 rebounds per game margin. But leading scorer Carl Krauser has been cold, hitting just five of 26 from the floor the last two games.
Louisville is shooting 42 percent from the field, and has a +.6 rebounds per game margin.
Both teams hold their opponents to 41 percent from the floor on the season.
In the latest RPI at NCAAsports.com, Pitt is ranked 7th, Louisville 68th. And in USA Today's Sagarin PREDICTOR rankings, the Panthers are 16th (86.5), while the Cardinals are 55th (82.0).
The over is a surprising 14-8 in Pitt games this season, but 8-16 in Louisville games.
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The Ultimatecapper Pick: Take Pittsburgh at -4!
