Houston Cougars vs Utah Utes Prediction, Odds and Picks for Today, 02/10/26

The Houston Cougars will play the second game in their mountain trip when they meet the Utah Utes on Tuesday in Salt Lake City. Houston comes into this game a winner of 4 straight and just a half-game behind Arizona in the conference standings after they it care of BYU 77-66 in Provo on Saturday, holding the blue Cougars to 1.12 points per possession on 42% shooting inside the arc and 36% shooting beyond it. Meanwhile, Utah sits at the bottom of the Big 12 standings with a 1-9 conference record, having lost 5 straight games — the most recent one at Kansas 71-59. 

There’s not much to like about this Utah squad. The Utes are dead last in the Big 12 in adjusted defensive efficiency, as well as bottom 3 in most other defensive metrics according to KenPom. They aren’t much better offensively, either, sitting 11th in the conference in adjusted efficiency and effective field-goal percentage, 12th in offensive rebounding rate and dead last in 2-point percentage  — which is noteworthy because the Utes don’t shoot a ton of threes. They operate mostly through rim attacks, attack-and-kicks, inside-outs and in transition, but unfortunately for them, the Cougars are in the 94th percentile or better defensively against all of those sets. 

On the other end of the floor, Houston has been a juggernaut — finding most success attacking the rim, in transition and in the mid-range. Utah is dreadful defensively in those 3 areas, sitting in just the 18th percentile against rim attacks, ninth percentile against mid-range shots and 38th percentile in transition defense. Houston should cruise.

Houston vs Utah prediction: Houston -16.5 (-110) available at the time of publishing. Playable to -17. 

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