Friday, March 7th, 9:00 p.m. (et).

FACTS & STATS: Site: Jenny Craig Pavilion (5,100) -- San Diego, California. Television: None. Home Record: LMU 2-11, USF 6-7. Away Record: LMU 2-13, USF 2-13. Neutral Record: LMU 1-1, USF 1-0. Conference Record: LMU 2-12, USF 5-9. Series Record: San Francisco leads, 91-33.

GAME NOTES: The first round of the 22nd annual West Coast Conference Tournament gets underway tonight, as the San Francisco Dons and the Lions of Loyola Marymount collide on the floor of Jenny Craig Pavilion in San Diego. The eighth-seeded Lions, who are tied with Pepperdine for the second-most WCC Tournament titles with three, come limping into the postseason on a seven-game slide and have won just once in the last 12 games. The team was trounced by San Diego in this same building back on Monday night in an 86-65 decision, leaving the group with just two conference wins and five triumphs overall in 2007-08. As for the Dons, under the direction of the legendary Eddie Sutton for much of the campaign, they actually closed the season with a flurry by winning back-to-back games and three of the last four as they earned the fifth seed. With respect to the all-time series between these two schools on the hardwood, the Dons hold a commanding 91-33 advantage over LMU, although both teams won at home versus the other during the regular season. The winner of this meeting will be back on the floor tomorrow night versus fourth-seeded Santa Clara.

Over the course of 30 regular-season games, the Lions were the ones who were preyed upon because their offense turned out to be so weak. The squad ranked last in the WCC with just 61.9 ppg and didn't do itself any favors by allowing opponents to produce a hefty 78.5 ppg this year. The result left LMU with a scoring margin of minus-16.6 ppg, by far the worst in the West Coast Conference. The only double-digit scorer on the roster is Orlando Johnson with his 12.1 ppg and with close to five rebounds per game he is also the top performer in that category as well. As a team, the Lions were last in the conference in both free-throw shooting and field goal accuracy at a mere 64.3 percent and 40.0 percent, respectively. The squad also came in last in rebounding margin as well, allowing the opposition to clear almost five and a half more boards per game.

Named a member of the WCC All-Conference team, Dior Lowhorn was a beast in the paint for the Dons this season, even if the team didn't perform all that well on a daily basis. Lowhorn led the program in both scoring and rebounding with averages of 20.7 points and 7.4 rebounds per contest, although his mere 22 assists over the course of 29 games could have used some work. Just getting back into the swing of things after being suspended because it was determined that he played professionally with a German team earlier in his career, Vince Polakovic has given the team a huge boost with his 18.6 ppg, while Manny Quezada has been here for the entire ride this season and has provided 13.7 ppg and a team-best 132 assists to a squad that is still trying to rebound from being second-to-last in the WCC with minus-6.1 ppg in scoring margin. Although he is not one of the team's double-digit scorers this season, Danny Cavic (9.5 ppg) still has the ability to influence the outcome of games with his 5.0 rpg and 45 percent shooting from three-point range.

The availability of Polakovic is huge for the Dons, more so than Sutton who is now just along for the ride. As long as USF can just feed the ball into Dior, the leading scorer in the conference, there shouldn't be any problem moving on to the next round.

Predicted Outcome

San Francisco 70, Loyola Marymount 62