Kentucky Wildcats and Santa Clara Broncos play in the first round of NCAA Tournament

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Santa Clara Broncos (26-8, 17-4 WCC) vs. Kentucky Wildcats (21-13, 12-9 SEC)

St. Louis; Friday, 12:15 p.m. EDT

BETMGM SPORTSBOOK LINE: Wildcats -3.5; over/under is 157.5

BOTTOM LINE: Kentucky and Santa Clara square off in the NCAA Tournament opening round.

The Wildcats are 12-9 against SEC opponents and 9-4 in non-conference play. Kentucky ranks eighth in the SEC in rebounding averaging 33.9 rebounds. Malachi Moreno leads the Wildcats with 6.4 boards.

The Broncos are 17-4 in WCC play. Santa Clara is 22-3 when it wins the turnover battle and averages 10.3 turnovers per game.

Kentucky is shooting 46.4% from the field this season, 1.3 percentage points higher than the 45.1% Santa Clara allows to opponents. Santa Clara scores 9.1 more points per game (82.9) than Kentucky gives up (73.8).

TOP PERFORMERS: Denzel Aberdeen is averaging 13.2 points and 3.6 assists for the Wildcats. Otega Oweh is averaging 20.7 points over the last 10 games.

Allen Graves is averaging 11.6 points, 6.5 rebounds and 1.9 steals for the Broncos. Aleksandar Gavalyugov is averaging 2.2 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games.

LAST 10 GAMES: Wildcats: 4-6, averaging 78.8 points, 32.6 rebounds, 15.1 assists, 6.8 steals and 3.4 blocks per game while shooting 44.7% from the field. Their opponents have averaged 79.8 points per game.

Broncos: 7-3, averaging 81.1 points, 30.4 rebounds, 15.0 assists, 8.0 steals and 2.4 blocks per game while shooting 45.4% from the field. Their opponents have averaged 76.3 points.

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The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive and data from Sportradar.