Oklahoma -28 at BAYLOR – I like the Sooners here because they seem
to have retained their focus, even after their benchmark dominant 15 point win at
Ohio St a couple of weeks ago. The proof of this is last week they slammed
Tulane by 42 points. Be mindful that
Tulane is actually ranked a little bit higher than the Baylor Mike Bears. One can make an argument that Oklahoma is the
best team in college football. One can
also make the argument that Baker Mayfield is the best quarterback in college
football. He’s not the most humble
person on the planet, and he’s certainly not going to pass up the opportunity
to pad his stats to keep the pole position in the Heisman race. Oklahoma is going to score at least 55 points
in this game, and there’s not much Baylor is going to be able to do about
it. Baylor won’t be able to hold the ball. Oklahoma has a very good pass defense and
Baylor’s QB was only 12/34 in their loss to Duke with 3 interceptions. I would count on at least one defensive score
by the Sooners this week. Baylor only
ran the ball in that game for 57 yards.
It will be very difficult for them to keep the ball out of Mayfield’s
hands and they certainly won’t be able to stop him once he has it. Baylor only scored 10 points against UTSA. This will be an easy game for Baylor to quit
and be pathetic, a la Rutgers last year at home against Michigan. Lay the wood on the Sooners and watch the
covered wagon zoom around the field.
Michigan -9.5 at PURDUE – There
has to be a reason why the computers have Michigan ranked 6th in the
country. It’s because they are really
really good. For some reason, people
seem to think Purdue is also good (the computers don’t, they have Purdue ranked
64th). The fact of the matter
is, Purdue is never good. What’s
interesting is that Michigan hasn’t played Purdue in 5 years, but other than
that, there really isn’t anything very interesting about this game. Purdue got everyone’s attention by giving a
fraudulent Louisville team all they could handle. Then in week 2 and week 3 they beat a bad
Ohio team and a pathetic Missouri team.
Purdue has a balanced offense, that has found success this year, but the
Wolverine defense is the hallmark of Harbaugh’s team. This
game is far too important for Michigan as they enter their Big 10
schedule. Michigan beat Florida at a
neutral site by 16 points – despite throwing 2 interceptions for
touchdowns. Florida is a lot better than
Purdue. They also beat Air Force by 16
and Air Force can run the ball a lot better than Purdue can. I like this game because it’s time for Michigan
to make a statement and they will have the 9 ½ points covered by the first
quarter. The Michigan defense will not
allow this game to get close. I don’t
see Purdue scoring more than 14 points and Michigan will definitely score at
least 30. I’m laying the wood on the
Maize and Blue to cover.
Utah – 3 at ARIZONA
–Last week Utah QB Tyler Huntley completed 30 of 43 passes for 341 yards and 4 TDs against San Jose State. This year Utah
is averaging 37 ppg on 477 total yards per game (294 passing yds/g; 183 rushing
yds/g). Arizona has a non-game last week
against UTEP, winning 63-16. All I saw
were Wildcats trying to decide what dance to do in the endzone every time I saw
a highlight from that game. Now it’s time for both teams to get serious – let’s
look at the two real games that each team had.
Utah went to BYU, always a tough place to play, and came away with a
19-13 win. Arizona’s only tough game was
at home, and they lost to Houston 19-16.
Their other two games were against Northern Arizona and the
aforementioned shit show which is UTEP.
Utah likes going on the road and is 4-0 against the spread in their last
4 road games. Meanwhile, Arizona is 7-15
against the spread in their last 22 home games. Utah’s defense is really tough,
much better than Houston’s defense and Houston really shut down Arizona. Both teams are off next week so I am
expecting a very physical game. Points will be at a premium but I don’t expect
Arizona to do much dancing in the end zone this week. I’m going with the road favorite and taking the
Utes.
FLORIDA ST – 11.5 vs NC STATE – This game is going to go down in
history as a HA HA special as my stomach will be so tight from laughing I’ll
have abs of steel by the end of the night.
If everyone watched the same game I did on opening night, I saw Florida
State’s front seven go toe to toe to Alabama and it wasn’t easy determining who
actually had the tougher and faster defense.
There’s no question that the Seminoles losing their QB that game took
the wind out of their sails but the reason they lost that game is because their
special teams coughed up the ball 3 times.
Now, the Seminoles and their new QB have had 3 weeks to prepare, and by
all accounts he’s ready for the job – beating out some experienced veterans. These kids are not 1 star recruits either,
trust me. Florida State is home and the
school can’t wait to get back to some normalcy and some football. That inappropriate tomahawk chop is going to
be loud that they will make Chief Wahoo look politically correct. The computers have FSU ranked 16th….I
think they are easily a top 10 team. On
the other hand, NC State is ranked 49th and I don’t think they
deserve to be ranked that high. NC State
lost by 7 at home to a fraudulent South Caroline team. They then beat a weak Marshall team and
followed with a beating of Mark Furman worthy of OJ’s approval. Having said all that, they are going on the
road to an incredibly hostile environment.
NC State only averaged 2.5 yards per carry running the ball against
South Carolina. You know what they say
about not being able to run the ball in a hostile environment? (I’ll give you a
hint, you lose). I think this time it’s
the Wolfpack going into the wrong den. I’m
laying the points on the home Seminoles…start chopping!
Akron +15 at TROY – Why would anyone want to bet on the Akron Zips
you might ask? The Zips lost 41-14 loss
to the visiting Iowa State Cyclones. Akron actually moved the ball fairly well in
that game, and was only trailing by 6 at halftime. Iowa State is a really good
football team, and they are much better than Troy. So the story here is I am expecting Akron to
score against a softer Troy defense and I love the 15 points as a result. Troy gave up 24 points to a New Mexico State
team whose power ranking is on par with Akron’s. That means Troy would have to score 40
points to cover this spread but their highest point total this year is 34 points
against Alabama State. You’re asking the
Trojans to cover a 15 point spread when they are only averaging 24.7 points per
game on offense and have yet to show any consistency on offense this year. Akron coming off a loss to a tough team may
be more battle ready this week than Troy in this non-conference game. I’m taking the points, because I like taking
points…let’s go Zips and give me that backdoor cover.