UC Davis hosts league-leading UC San Diego in the final game of the regular season, and ESPN2 will air the contest from University Credit Union Center on Saturday, March 8 at 8 p.m. PT.
UCSD (24-4, 14-2 BW) holds a one-game lead in The Big West standings with two weeks remaining before teams converge on Lee’s Family Forum in Henderson, Nev., for the 2025 Hercules Tires Big West Men’s Basketball Championship, presented by Credit Union 1.
UCSD is riding a nine-game winning streak, tied for fourth in the nation and enters the penultimate week of play ranked second in the Mid-Major Top 25 and 37th in the NET. Offensively, the Tritons boast four double-digit scorers in Aniwaniwa Tait-Jones (19.8 ppg), Tyler McGhie (16.8 ppg), Hayden Gray (11.1 ppg) and Nordin Kapic (10.3 ppg). Tait-Jones connects on 58.5 percent of his attempts from the floor and has attempted more free throws than anyone else in the country (242). From distance, Tyler McGhie averaged 3.39 three pointers per game to rank seventh nationally and is just five more makes from beyond the arc away from reaching 100 on the season. Gray paces NCAA Division I in steals per game (3.46) to help in the team’s nation-leading effort of a +7.2 turnover margin.
UC Davis (15-13, 9-8 BW) enters this week needing one more win to punch their ticket to The Big West postseason. The Aggies are led by the offense of TY Johnson, whose 21.5 points per game is good for tops in The Big West and fifth nationally. Also feisty on the defensive end, Johnson averages 2.32 steals per game, only trailing Gray in the league rankings. Big man Niko Rocak patrols the paint for UC Davis, tallying 2.00 blocks per game to lead the conference along with a team-best 7.3 rebounds per game. Interestingly, Rocak’s older brother Toni played two seasons for the Tritons.
Historically, the series as Division I foes has just eight meetings, with the Aggies winning five of them and the two split the regular-season series in 2024. In their last time on the court on Feb. 15 in La Jolla, the home team prevailed 85-60 with McGhie’s 22 points and four triples leading the way for UCSD.
Following the conclusion of the wildcard matchup, the bracket will be set for the 2025 Hercules Tires Big West Men’s Basketball Championship, presented by Credit Union 1, with the top eight teams heading to Henderson to compete for the league’s automatic bid to compete in the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Championship.
Tipping off on Wednesday, March 12, all games from Lee’s Family Forum will be televised on ESPN+, with the two semifinals on Friday, March 14 and the championship game on Saturday, March 15 also appearing on ESPN’s linear networks. For additional championship information, please visit
BigWest.org/2025. To learn more information and to subscribe to ESPN+, please visit
espn.com/watch.
About The Big West
The Big West is an NCAA Division I member with 11 members with the shared goal of empowering every student-athlete in competition and in life and uniting its university communities through championship experiences. Formed in 1969, The Big West membership consists of Cal Poly, Cal State Bakersfield, Cal State Fullerton, CSUN, Hawai‘i, Long Beach State, UC Davis, UC Irvine, UC Riverside, UC San Diego and UC Santa Barbara. The Big West is united in the pursuit of boundless opportunities, enduring integrity, bold activism, fearless innovation and the pacific spirit of freedom, exploration and progress.
The Big West sponsors 21 sports at the NCAA Division I level: baseball, softball, men’s and women’s basketball, men’s and women’s volleyball, women’s beach volleyball, men’s and women’s cross country, men’s and women’s golf, men’s and women’s soccer, men’s and women’s tennis, men’s and women’s track and field, men’s and women’s water polo and men's and women's swimming and diving. For more information, visit BigWest.org or follow The Big West on X @BigWestSports.