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LOS ANGELES, Calif. - In front of the eighth-largest crowd in Gersten Pavilion history, the Loyola Marymount men's basketball team competed until the very end with the nation's third-ranked team. Now, the Lions (17-9, 5-7 WCC) must bring the same energy as the West Coast Conference's second place team comes to Hank's House for the WCC Game of the Week.
 
Both teams battled on Thursday night during the home stretch of the conference schedule. LMU held a lead with eight and a half minutes to play against the Zags and BYU topped San Diego in overtime, 88-80.
 
BYU (24-2, 11-0 WCC) brings their four-game win streak to The Bluff for a 1 p.m. Saturday game airing on Spectrum Sportsnet in the Los Angeles market. The Lions led at the half of their first meeting back in Provo to open the month, before the Cougars were able to pull away.
 
Finding additional scoring will be a factor that can be a difference in this edition of the matchup. LMU scored a season-low 49 points in the first meeting between the two schools, with James Batemon's 10 points being the only Lion in double-figures. In comparison, five Lions scored in double-digits in this week's Valentine's showdown with Gonzaga. Dameane Douglas led the team with 13 points, James Batemon scored a dozen, Eli Scott and Mattias Markusson scored a dozen apiece, and Petr Herman scored 10 off the bench.
 
Similarly to the first meeting, these two teams are on opposite ends of the league rankings in scoring defense. LMU allows 62.2 ppg, which ranks 13th in the nation, whereas BYU allows 75.6 pgg, the most in the WCC.
 
Following Thursday's sellout crowd of 4,213, the eighth largest in Gersten Pavilion attendance in facility history and most since 2006, LMU has the opportunity to make another memorable atmosphere with the game tying in with the University's family weekend and the Athletics Hall of Fame class inductees.