March Madness Round 1: Long Beach State vs Arizona Lines & Score
Wildcats Are Big Fave's, Can LB Surprise?
Long Beach State vs Arizona Final Score
Long Beach State vs Arizona Preview
One of the craziest college basketball stories of the last couple days was how Long Beach State fired longtime head coach Dan Monson — who has been there since 2007 — last Monday and then went on to win the Big West Tournament and secure the school’s first NCAA Tournament since 2012.
Their reward? No. 2 Arizona in what looks like a lopsided Thursday afternoon matchup on the Long Beach State vs Arizona lines but is actually pretty intriguing.
Long Beach State’s dismissal of Monson was classified as a “mutual parting of ways” but it was, in reality, a firing after his team collapsed down the stretch of the regular season, losing its last five games to slip to the No. 5 seed in the conference.
However, Monson was allowed to coach his team in its conference tournament and then it did the unthinkable: Beat UC-Riverside, beat top seeded UC-Irvine and then beat No. 3 seed UC-Davis to earn an automatic bid to the Big Dance. Safe to say those were some unexpected March Madness scores.
But, now, as a No. 15 seed, Long Beach State has an incredibly difficult task ahead. Arizona won the Pac-12 regular season title and, despite losing to Oregon in the Pac-12 Tournament, the Wildcats boast one of the country’s best offenses and are at the top of the leaderboards in a ton of statistical categories.
Tommy Lloyd’s team can do damage in a lot of different ways which is why it’s favored by 21.5 points.
Long Beach State Beach vs Arizona Wildcats 
Day/Time:
Location: Delta Center; Salt Lake City, Utah
Streaming: TBS
Wildcats Should Score At Will
The Long Beach State vs Arizona lines recognize that Arizona — which was third in the nation in points per game, third in assists, 14th in field goal percentage and 24th in three-point percentage — probably will put up a ton of points against a Long Beach State team that was 287th nationally in points per game allowed.
Caleb Love, who made the Final Four with North Carolina in 2022, is the Wildcats’ leading scorer and he should feast on the Beach’s defense.
Arizona has a big size advantage considering that Long Beach State’s biggest rotation player is just 6’9″. That will help the Arizona Wildcats continue to aggressively attack the rim, a strength of their as they take the 15th most free throws in the country.
To make matters worse for Dan Monson‘s team, Long Beach State commits a ton of fouls. Only six teams in Division 1 committed more personal fouls than the Beach did this season. Arizona isn’t a great free throw shooting team but the Wildcats will be living at the line.
Another issue for Long Beach State is three-point defense. They allow a ton of threes, both attempts (8th-most in the country) and makes (9th-most), and Arizona — while not a big volume outside-shooting team — is 24th in the country in terms of three-point percentage. That’s not a good sign for Long Beach State’s chances in the college basketball standings.
Beach Needs to Draw Fouls and Make Free Throws
Long Beach State’s offensive attack is decidedly not perimeter-focused. Monson’s team is toward the bottom of the barrel in terms of three-point takes, makes and efficiency (just 31%).
Because they just don’t have many outside shooters, Long Beach State takes a ton of twos (fourth-most per game in Division 1) and gets fouled a lot (13th-most free throws attempts per game). The issue is that the Beach just isn’t great at converting those free throws, doing so at just a 71% clip.
Interestingly, Arizona also commits a ton of fouls (nearly 20 per game) which gives Long Beach State a potential path toward putting points on the board. Monson operates a pretty fast-paced style so Long Beach State, while putting up almost 80 points per game, is just 145th in offensive efficiency per KenPom.
The Beach’s adjusted tempo is 29th in the country, so they like to speed things up and beat opponents down the floor to get to the rim.
The Long Beach State vs Arizona lines expect Arizona to control the pace of the game but, as a team that plays at an even faster rate than Long Beach State, the Wildcats could potentially play right into Long Beach State’s favor. Of course, Arizona is much more talented and its bigs — like Oumar Bello — are probably going to dominate.
But, there is a way for Long Beach State to keep things competitive and that includes winning the foul battle, making free throws and trying to keep Arizona off the three-point line.
Altitude Could Play A Role
The college basketball schedule put this game at an interesting time in an interesting place. It’ll be an early local tip — around noon mountain time — and will be played at altitude in Salt Lake City. Both teams will have to deal with the same effects of playing at high elevation but that, coupled with the early tip, could bode well for Long Beach State.
It wouldn’t be wise to predict an upset but the spread is big and this is clearly a Beach team that is playing hard for its soon-to-be-former coach. Arizona has also lost two of its last three games overall and No. 2 seed’s have been ripe for upsets in recent tournaments. Don’t overlook Beach.
Also, the over/under is a high 161 points but, with how fast these teams play and how many fouls they each commit, the over might be the way to go.
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