Thursday, March 5th, 10:05 p.m. (et).

FACTS & STATS: Site: Lawlor Events Center (11,536) -- Reno, Nevada. Television: None. Home Record: SJSU 7-7, Nevada 10-6. Away Record: SJSU 5-7, Nevada 7-5. Neutral Record: SJSU 1-0, Nevada 0-0. Conference Record: SJSU 6-8, Nevada 9-5. Series Record: San Jose State leads, 47-42.

GAME NOTES: The Nevada Wolf Pack try to maintain their place in the Western Athletic Conference standings tonight as they clash with the San Jose State Spartans at the Lawlor Events Center in Reno. Coming into tonight's action, the Pack is all alone in second place in the standings with a record of 9-5 with this and a meeting against Boise State still remaining in the regular season before the league tournament begins next week. On Saturday, the team handed Utah State just its second conference loss of the season by dealing the Aggies an 84-71 setback in the Silver State. The victory was the fourth in the last five outings for the Pack. On the other side of the coin, the Spartans are hitting the road for the first time since Valentine's Day when they lost at Idaho. In between there's been three wins in four chances for SJSU, the most recent of those being a 61-59 triumph over Hawaii on Saturday night. At 6-8 in conference, with a bout against Utah State waiting this Saturday, the Spartans are in the middle of the pack in the standings, fourth from the bottom. The Spartans lead the all-time series between the two programs by a count of 47-42, although Nevada was the one to win the first meeting of the season back on February 12th by a score of 80-68 on the road in California.

Trailing by five with just over three minutes to play against a visiting Hawaii squad, Adrian Oliver took control down the stretch, hitting a jumper and a pair of free throws to provide the hosts with the two-point win. Oliver tied for the game high with his 20 points, shooting 8-of-14 from the floor, while C.J. Webster contributed 12 points and ripped down eight rebounds in the victory as well. Oliver, who has played just 15 of the team's 27 games this season, leads the group in scoring with 18.2 ppg, although his 26.8 percent shooting behind the three-point line is rather suspect. Tim Pierce comes up with another 12.9 ppg and is responsible for nearly six rebounds per game, while Webster puts up 11.8 ppg and 6.4 rpg to help on the glass as well and give the group a rebounding advantage of better than four per game to this point in the season.

The Wolf Pack sent Utah State a stern reminder that there's more than just one team in the WAC this season, handing the Aggies a 13-point defeat in Reno over the weekend. Armon Johnson was credited with a game-high 28 points, shooting 11-of-18 from the floor, while Luke Babbitt came up a rebound shy of a double- double as he tallied 21 points. Not to be overlooked was Brandon Fields who tallied 16 points off the bench for the group. Shooting slightly better than 50 percent from the field, Nevada also turned the ball over a mere four times. In conference games this season Babbitt is generating 17.4 points and 7.7 rebounds per outing, hitting not only 85.1 percent at the free-throw line, but also 43.2 percent behind the three-point line which tends to stretch the defense and open up the middle for his teammates. Johnson comes in with 15.9 ppg and is responsible for almost four assists per game for the group. The knock against Nevada in WAC play is that it is allowing opponents to shoot 40.1 percent from three-point range right now.

Having shown that they can still handle a team like Utah State, give the nod to the Wolf Pack tonight, especially with them being at home.

Predicted Outcome

Nevada 79, San Jose State 70