Queens Royals at BYU Cougars
Tuesday, November 10, 2026
9:00 PM ET, Marriott Center
No. 23 BYU is a 28.5-point favorite over Queens with a total of 181.5, and my play is Queens +28.5.
Yes, I know. Queens just got run over 118-68 at Oklahoma State. Nobody wants to touch this team tonight, and that is exactly why the number is fat.
The market is pricing the Oklahoma State tape
Earlier this week BYU was hanging around -25.5. Now the market sits at 28.5. The models didn’t move with it. KenPom projects BYU 100, Queens 76, a 24-point game. Bart Torvik’s efficiency numbers land in a similar spot, with BYU scoring about 120 points per 100 possessions against a Queens defense that ranks 320th in the country. Do the math with a little home cooking and you get a BYU win in the low-20s.
That’s a blowout. It’s just not a 29-point blowout, and in a buy game that gap is everything.
The Oklahoma State game was a mess, but it was a specific mess. Queens turned it over 18 times, one fewer than it had in its first two games combined. Coach Grant Leonard said the Cowboys “extended into passing lanes and slowed down our ball movement.” BYU can do that, but its calling card is a shooting gallery, not 40 minutes of full-court pressure.
The BEST 2026 Basketball Bonus: Deposit $100 to $1000 and get a 75% real cash bonus when you deposit using Bitcoin at Bovada Sportsbook!
Kevin Young wants the bench to eat
BYU is loaded. Robert Wright III is pouring in 27 a night after a career-high 35 against Ohio State, and Syracuse transfer Tyler Betsey has hit 10 of 14 threes in two games. The Cougars put up 108 on Omaha and won the fast-break battle 31-0. Their non-conference home streak sits at 27 straight wins.
But listen to what Young said this week. He wants that production coming from the second unit too, and he got 25 bench points against Omaha with 11 players logging double-digit minutes. “That’s important for the chemistry of the group,” Young said. A coach who’s thinking about chemistry with a 25-point lead is a coach who’s emptying the bench with 8 minutes left. That’s where a 28.5-point spread goes to die.
Queens can actually score
This is no pushover from the bottom of Division I. Queens won the ASUN Tournament last March, was picked first in the league again, and brought back Nasir Mann, Jordan Watford and Avantae Parker. Mann is averaging 19.3 points and just won ASUN Player of the Week after a 28-point night at Loyola Marymount. The Royals hung 103 on Winthrop and 96 on LMU, they push the pace, and they live at the rim.
They will give up a ton of points. They will also put up enough garbage-time buckets against BYU’s reserves to keep this inside the number.
Why I could be wrong
The Oklahoma State game is the scary part. A Big 12 team beat Queens by 50 on Friday, and BYU is the better team and the better shooting team, period. The Cougars are 8-0 under Young when they make 15 or more threes, and Queens has been leaking open looks all season. If Betsey and Wright get hot early and the Royals’ legs are gone at the end of a road trip that has dragged them through four time zones in four games, this gets ugly fast. Early-season ratings still lean on preseason priors, so I’m trusting a small sample here too.
Projected score: BYU 99, Queens 76
The Pick: Queens +28.5 (-112)
Grab the points in a game everyone else is laying, and bring some extra bankroll into Tuesday night. New players at MyBookie Sportsbook get a 100% REAL CASH bonus on a first deposit of $100 to $300 with promo code PREDICT100. That’s a FREE way to bet Queens +28.5 and the rest of your Tuesday college basketball picks.
