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Cal State-Northridge (13-17, 8-6) at UC-Irvine (21-10, 13-2) – 10:00 PM EST (ESPN3)
Tonight’s UTR Game of the Day takes us to the West Coast and Orange County in California where the Anteaters of UC-Irvine host the Matadors of Cal State-Northridge. Irvine comes into tonight’s game on a six game winning streak and have avenged their only two losses in conference play with wins against Long Beach State and UC-Santa Barbara. Collin Welp has averaged 13.0 points a game and 5.9 rebounds a game for the Anteaters.
While UC-Irvine has long since clinched the regular season championship and subsequent #1 seed in the Big West, CSUN is one of three teams tied for second place in the conference right now; they are tied with UC-Davis and UC-Santa Barbara at 8-6 in conference play at the moment. The Matadors have the toughest schedule of the three teams; they also have a home game against Hawai’i for their regular season finale (UC-Davis plays Hawai’i and at UC-Riverside; UCSB hosts both Cal State-Fullerton and Cal Poly) in addition to tonight’s game. Lamine Diane is one of the nation’s top scorers with a whopping 25.5 points a game; he also averages 10.1 rebounds a game as well.