East Carolina vs UTSA Prediction 2/8/25 College Basketball Picks

The East Carolina Pirates and the UTSA Roadrunners meet Saturday in college basketball action from UTSA Convocation Center. Here’s an East Carolina vs UTSA prediction. We will look at this from a betting perspective and determine the best East Carolina vs UTSA pick. We will examine: 

The East Carolina Pirates’ recent form and player performance

The UTSA Roadrunners’ recent form and player performance 

Recent betting trends and streaks involving the East Carolina Pirates

Recent betting trends and streaks involving the UTSA Roadrunners

Recent betting trends in games played between East Carolina and UTSA

A summary that ties it all together and produces a favorable betting outcome for the East Carolina vs UTSA game

East Carolina Pirates Betting Preview

East Carolina started out the year on a pretty nice run but they’ve been choppy since December began. The Pirates beat NC Wesleyan, Coastal Carolina, Mount Olive, George Mason, Stetson, UIC, and North Carolina A&T during a 7-1 start, then hit a 2-8 run over the next 10 outings. those losses were versus UNC Wilmington, South Carolina, North Alabama, Gardner-Webb, South Florida, Florida Atlantic, Memphis, and North Texas—with wins over Florida International and Temple otherwise. The Pirates have since beaten Wichita State, Tulsa, and South Florida ahead of losses to Temple and Rice. That gives the Pirates a 12-11 overall run through the first 23 games of the season so far. 

In the Rice matchup back on Wednesday, the Pirates faced a 33-25 deficit going into the second half. East Carolina was outscored 40-35 the rest of the way during a 73-60 loss in the end. Leading the team in scoring was CJ Walker with 23 points and six rebounds with a pair of blocks. RJ Felton added 14 points with seven rebounds and four assists, while Cam Hayes led the bench scoring seven points, two rebounds, one assist, and one steal in 18 minutes. 

UTSA Roadrunners Betting Preview

Over on the UTSA side, they’ve been fighting against a .500 record for most of the year—and failing lately. The Roadrunners went 6-5 over their first 11 outings. The wins in that time were over Trinity TX, Merrimack, Houston Christian, North Dakota (twice), and Southwestern Adventist. Since then UTSA has won just four of their last 11 outings. Those wins were over Wichita State, Rice, Temple, and North Texas. Otherwise, it was losses to Army, Tulane, Tulsa, North Texas, UAB, Florida Atlantic, and Tulane again in that time, giving the Roadrunners a 10-12 mark through their 22 games so far this year. 

On Wednesday matched up against Tulane, and the Roadrunners came out of the break with a 33-25 edge. UTSA faltered in the second half on a 36-27 deficit and took the loss at the end 61-60 during a tough result. Leading team scorer Marcus Millender posted 28 points with five boards and three assists. Raekwon Horton added 11 points with three rebounds, one assist, and two steals, while Baboucarr Njie led the bench scoring seven points with three rebounds and a pair of steals in 30 minutes on the floor. 

Why the UTSA Roadrunners will win

• UTSA has won each of its last four home games following a home loss.

Why the East Carolina Pirates will win

• UTSA has lost four of its last five night games against non-AP-ranked opponents.
• East Carolina has won four of its last five road night games against Conference opponents.

East Carolina vs UTSA Prediction 

I’ll take a stab at UTSA here. The Roadrunners didn’t have a great game versus Tulane in their last outing though, especially in the second half. UTSA shot just 32.8 percent from the field in that one and missed eight of their 22 free throws (63.6 percent). That said, the Roadrunners still rebounded well (35) and had 12 points off 16 Green Wave turnovers. UTSA has scored just 114 combined points in their last two outings though, so I’d like to see that shooting percentage—and points total—come up significantly here. 

As for ECU, they’ve been below 65 points in two of the last three but they normally score better than that. UTSA is going to have to hit the gas on offense in order to keep a good pace here, but I think it’s doable.