UC Irvine faces UC Riverside after Saran’s 24-point outing

UC Riverside Highlanders (4-4) at UC Irvine Anteaters (5-4)

Irvine, California; Thursday, 10 p.m. EST

BOTTOM LINE: UC Irvine faces UC Riverside after Derin Saran scored 24 points in UC Irvine’s 72-63 victory over the San Jose State Spartans.

The Anteaters have gone 3-2 in home games. UC Irvine has a 2-4 record against teams over .500.

The Highlanders are 2-3 on the road. UC Riverside scores 75.0 points while outscoring opponents by 2.6 points per game.

UC Irvine averages 79.7 points, 7.3 more per game than the 72.4 UC Riverside allows. UC Riverside averages 11.4 more points per game (75.0) than UC Irvine gives up to opponents (63.6).

The Anteaters and Highlanders face off Thursday for the first time in conference play this season.

TOP PERFORMERS: Jurian Dixon is shooting 40.0% from beyond the arc with 1.8 made 3-pointers per game for the Anteaters, while averaging 15.9 points. Saran is shooting 46.2% and averaging 15.0 points.

Andrew Henderson is scoring 17.6 points per game and averaging 4.3 rebounds for the Highlanders. Osiris Grady is averaging 13.6 points and 7.0 rebounds.

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The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive and data from Sportradar.