The two most winningest programs in college basketball history will play each other this week when the UCLA Bruins host the No. 1 ranked Kentucky Wildcats at Pauley Pavilion in Los Angeles, California on Thursday night.
UCLA and their 11 national championships will welcome Kentucky’s eight to create the most prestigious matchup of the college basketball season. However, this season the Kentucky Wildcats will be favorites on the road against the UCLA Bruins as head coach John Calipari has another stacked roster that has already proved its mettle in the early part of the season.
Kentucky is a perfect 7-0 as one can imagine with the aforementioned No. 1 ranking, with a win against a top-10 Duke Blue Devils team at a neutral site in mid-November. This will be Kentucky’s second true road game of the season, winning their first against South Florida just days ago.
UCLA has not shared the same success, or anything close to resembling it. It has been rough sledding from the jump, as the Bruins lost their opening game to Monmouth by three points. After getting their feet under them and beating a quality UNLV team by two points, the Bruins were no match for Kansas in a 19-point loss and couldn’t recover four days later, losing to Wake Forest by three.
Playing the best of the best can helps teams that are struggling, which is exactly what the Bruins want to believe heading into Thursday night. On the secondary ticket market, UCLA tickets against Kentucky have an average price of $196.69 with a get-in price of $31 according to TiqIQ.com. On October 28th the average ticket price was as high as $501.13 but has been falling. By November 17th the average ticket price was $382.96 and fell to $212.74 three days later on November 20th. The average price has remained somewhat steady since then, but still has a few more days to possibly fall before tip off.
The game against Kentucky is the second most expensive home game for the Bruins this season, only trailing a January 7th contest against the Arizona Wildcats.
Fans outside of the UCLA campus or the most diehard Kentucky fans can find affordable Los Angeles flights on Hipmunk.com to get into a seat at Pauley Pavilion.
