College Basketball Odds: No. 21 Mississippi at No. 6 West Virginia

You can catch tonight's Mississippi Rebels vs. West Virginia Mountaineers on ESPN2 @ 6:30 PM EST. (AP Images)

Enjoy tonight’s Ole Miss-West Virginia matchup because college basketball then takes two days off because of the holidays, and this might well be the last Top 25 matchup you see until 2010. The Mountaineers have opened as 10.5-point favorites on Bodog’s college basketball odds (and that has since moved to 11.5 points).

WVU (8-0, 3-4 ATS) is one of just eight unbeaten teams left in the country, but it enters off a very fortunate 80-78 win Saturday over Cleveland State in which the Mountaineers blew a 17-point second-half lead. WVU had a season-high 17 turnovers in the game and had trouble with the press.

Ole Miss (10-1, 5-2 ATS) had no problems Saturday, shooting 67 percent in crushing Centenary 108-64. The Rebels’ only loss this year was a 12-point setback to an excellent Villanova team. They are a guard-oriented tam that is sixth in the country in scoring offense (85.4 ppg). Five players score in double figures, led by guards Chris Warren (18.3) and Terrico White (16.6), and the Rebels make a lot of 3-pointers (8.7 per game, No. 22 in nation).

The Mountaineers, meanwhile, are No. 15 in scoring defense in allowing just 58 points per game – the 66 points they gave up to Cleveland State was a season high. West Virginia has won 29 straight home games in the month of December and 28 consecutive non-conference home games overall. Forward Kevin Jones is the only WVU player to score in double figures in every game this season and is averaging 15.5 points and 7.3 rebounds (first on team) and ranks No. 31 nationally in shooting 58.5 percent from the field.

West Virginia and Ole Miss have only met once, and that was in Oxford last year when the Mountaineers won 80-78. Also, Mississippi hasn’t beaten a Top 10 team since 1998 and has never beaten a non-conference team ranked that high.

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