Connecticut Huskies vs Xavier Musketeers Prediction, Odds and Picks for Today, 12/31/25

A New Year’s Eve, Big East clash between the 12-1 UConn Huskies and the 9-4 Xavier Musketeers tips off at 5:00 pm ET on Peacock, kick-starting the second half of the season for both teams. The Huskies went into the holiday break on an 8-game winning streak, with their most recent wins over DePaul, Butler and Texas. The Musketeers went into their break winners of 6 out of 7 after a 3-3 start. This will be the first of two meetings between these teams, and it will be played at Xavier’s Cintas Center. 

The atmosphere in the arena may not have the same type of juice as it would in late January since students are still on winter break and due to the fact that it’s New Year’s Eve. That may hurt Xavier’s home-court advantage, but I still lean to the Muskies to keep it close on Thursday. UConn is undoubtedly one of the best defenses in the country, sitting 3rd nationally in effective field goal percentage and 4th in KenPom’s defensive efficiency. However, Xavier is a senior-leaden team that is 10th nationally in turnover rate, top-85 in three-point percentage with multiple 38%+ shooters, and top-40 in opposing offensive rebounding rate. Those are good recipes for success as an underdog with a double-digit spread. For what it’s worth, Xavier is 4-1 ATS as an underdog this year.

UConn vs Xavier prediction: Xavier Musketeers +12.5 (-110) at the time of publishing. Playable to +11.

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