Tennessee vs San Diego State

Written by Jack Jones

In the Midwest Region of the NCAA Tournament, the 6-seed Tennessee Volunteers meet up with the 11-seed San Diego State Aztecs. College basketball lines are available on this game, with Tennessee -3 over San Diego State. So as you can see, the books give the slight edge to the Vols but not by much.

Tennessee has gotten through a season of turmoil about as well as anyone could expect. They had to deal with suspensions to several key players, including Tyler Smith who remains out for the season. The Vols are going dancing for a fifth straight year, but they feel they are deserving of a higher seeding. They have wins over Kansas and Kentucky this season, both No. 1 seeds in the NCAA Tournament. Their 25-8 record and 11-5 mark in SEC play along with those victories should warrant a better seed. There’s a good chance that their 29-point loss to Kentucky in the SEC Tournament really hurt them in the eyes of public perception, and the fact that they play in the weak SEC. Either way, this team has faced a lot of adversity this year and will be mentally tough entering the Big Dance.

The Aztecs have made six trips to the NCAA Tournament, but SDSU has never won a tournament game. That is certainly one of their goals this season as they take on the Volunteers as an 11-seed. The Aztecs went 25-8 in the regular season and 11-5 in the Mountain West Conference, finishing in third place. They beat No. 1 seed New Mexico and host UNLV on their way to winning the MWC Tournament championship, which gave them an automatic bid. SDSU has a chance against Tennessee because of the way they play defense and rebound. Led by Kawhi Leonard and his 9.9 RPG, the Aztecs are out-rebounding their foes by 6.7 boards/game. They are very balanced offensively, with four players averaging in double figures scoring, led by Kawhi at 12.8 PPG.

Comments

One Response to “Tennessee vs San Diego State”

Mike on March 17th, 2010 7:39 AM

SDSU will get the upset

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