Both undefeated to start the Conference USA season, North Texas and UTSA meet Saturday afternoon at the UTSA Convocation Center for an important in-state showdown.
The game is scheduled to start at 4 p.m. ET. While it won’t be broadcast nationally on television anywhere in the US, you can still watch the game live on your computer, phone or streaming device via ESPN+, the new digital streaming service from ESPN that has exclusive coverage to dozens of college basketball games — and several other sports–every week.
You can sign up for a free seven-day trial of ESPN+ right here, and you can then watch a live stream of the game on your computer via ESPN.com, or on your phone (Android and iPhone compatible), tablet, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, PlayStation 4, Xbox One or other compatible streaming device via the ESPN app.
If you can’t watch live, all games — including North Texas vs UTSA — that are streamed on ESPN+ are also available to be watched afterwards on-demand via ESPN.com or the ESPN app.
North Texas vs UTSA Preview
Following an 8-22 record in Tony Benford’s last season as head coach, North Texas has seen a lightning-quick turnaround under Grant McCasland. The former Baylor assistant and Arkansas State head coach led the Mean Green to a 20-18 record last year, including a CBI championship, and now they’re off to the best start in school history at 16-1.
For reference, North Texas’ 16 wins–which they have with two months left in the season, mind you–is already tied for the 14th most in school history. If every play gets their talent stolen by the Monstars and they lose their final 10 games of the season, they’ll still finish with their second-most wins in the last seven years.
Granted, their non-conference schedule was pretty soft, as their best win came against New Mexico, who are 163rd nationally in Ken Pomeroy’s adjusted efficiency rankings. But the Mean Green have continued their success with four straight wins to start Conference USA play, including a 58-51 win against UTEP on the road Thursday.
“They played good defense to start the game, but at halftime coach had a good game plan for us so we just had to keep fighting as a team,” said freshman guard Umoja Gibson, who had 13 points, seven rebounds and three assists in the win. “It was a team effort, because we weren’t sharing the ball at first, but we did better in the second half.”
UTSA has taken a bit of a different path to this important matchup.
The Roadrunners lost their first five games of the season–including an embarrassing one-point defeat against Division II St. Edwards–and seven of their first 10. By the time they entered conference play, they were just 6-7 with three of those wins coming against D-II opponents.
But Steve Henson’s team has started to put things together with three wins to start their Conference USA slate, beating UTEP twice and Rice by 16 on Thursday. It’s the school’s best start to conference play since the 1990-91 campaign, and though they were tabbed to finish fifth in the C-USA preseason poll, a win against their in-state rivals on Saturday would establish UTSA as a legitimate threat in the league.
North Texas leads the all-time series against UTSA, 15-10. They’ve also won each of the last four head-to-head meetings and are 5-2 since they both joined Conference USA. With both teams off to tremendous conference starts, though, this may be the biggest matchup yet.
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How to Watch North Texas vs UTSA Basketball Online