Louisiana-Lafayette Tonights Big Play
The North Texas Mean Green have quietly won six straight games to improve to 19-8 overall while playing in the obscurity that is the Sun Belt Conference, but they will not have a cakewalk when they host the Louisiana-Lafayette Ragin’ Cajuns Thursday night.
The Cajuns may be just 13-14, but they have won five of their last seven games and they generally keep games close. Granted, they are 3-10 on the road, but they are only losing their road games vs. Division I opponents by an average of -4.4 points, a margin that would cover this contest.
Although UL Lafayette is only 1-3 straight up in their last four road games, two of those losses were by two points and the third was by four points, meaning they would be 4-0 against the spread vs. this number in those games. They also upset the Mean Green back in Lafayette 74-72 last month.
Now North Texas certainly had an impressive record, but they also appear to be a bit lucky, as their overall average margin of victory of +3.3 points is rather low for a 19-8 team. The problem has been defense, as the Mean Green rank just 205 in the country in defensive efficiency according to the Pomeroy Ratings, allowing 1.032 points per possession after adjusting for their schedule.
We feel that shaky defense trumps the revenge factor here, so I look for Lafayette to hang tough in this game right down to the final buzzer.
