Road teams ranked 77 places better are usually favored by 20+ points and Utah and Tulsa are the perfect examples this week. When these teams are not favored by 20+, especially if they are ranked, it is an immediate red flag alert for me. Ball State is a ranked team that is laying less than 20 this week and that puts them in the same spot as ECU against Tulane and Auburn vs Mississippi State earlier this year. These two teams have been favored by 11 and 10 but they were ranked 81 and 85 places better while Ball State is ranked 100 places better, hence Ball State is favored by a few more points.
BST -16 @ WKY
Play: WKY +17 BUY 1
Ball State is 6-0 and their wins over Toledo and Indiana on the road were impressive. Not trying to take anything away from their success, but their schedule has been very soft, filled with overrated or underachieving teams. They won at Toledo last week, a team that usually plays well at home, but also a team that never really recovered from their OT loss to Fresno in which they tried to win on 2 pts convert and failed. The following week they lost at home to FIU as huge favorites and then they only played one half (trailed 3-0) against Ball State. In last three weeks Ball State won against Toledo, Kent and Indiana, three teams that have a combined record of 5-11 (3-10-1 ats). Western Kentucky is 2-4 SU and 2-3-1 ATS but their schedule has been brutal. Road games @ VT, @KKY, @ALA and @IND for a team that just joined division I-A football is huge. They are battle tested and they kept it relatively close last week at Virginia Tech thruout the game. They don't play at home all that often, let alone against ranked opponents and this will be their Bowl game right here. Last year they played @ Ball State and trailed by only 2 at the halftime, outrushing them 222-75 and having 34 minutes of possession. They know they can play Ball State close. This game reminds me a lot of Maryland's game at Virginia last week. Maryland was not ranked but they got tons of votes and would be ranked with a win at Virginia. As it turns out, they had a favorable schedule and they were not as good as advertised. Ball State is ranked and even the biggest BST backers are probably surprised. It's time for them to have a letdown here.
6-0 teams against 2-4 teams, favored by less than 17 are 0-6 ATS in last 6, losing against the spread by at least 14 pts in every game. And when on the road, these teams are 0-3 SU and ATS losing by 27 pts ATS on average.
This is Ball State's fourth road game in 5 games, with no bye.
The secondteam in this group of road teams that are not favored by as many points as expected is Vanderbilt. This could be the fishiest line so far this season.
VAN -2.5 @ MISST
Play: Mississippi State +3 BUY 0.5
This could be the fishiest line so far this season. The unbeaten and ranked Vanderbilt team, rated 80 places better than 1-4 Mississippi State is favored by only 2.5. To give you an idea how fishy this line is, I will tell you that no other road team ranked at least 69 places better has been favored by less than 7. No other road team ranked 51 places better has been favored by 3 or less. The first road team that I found, ranked better than the home team, and favored by less than 3 was Oregon State at -2.5 at Stanford. They lost outright. They were ranked 49 places better, in week 1. And we are in week 7 and Vanderbilt is ranked 80 places better.
So why such a short line ?
First, Vanderbilt won their biggest game in ages last week, after trailing 13-0 to Auburn, with their backup QB. They played their asses off in that game and just like Maryland against Clemson two weeks ago, they are probably spent both physically and emotionally, and can not have the same energy and desire in a road game against a lesser opponent (on paper) at Mississippi State. Before that they won a rivalery game as underdogs at Ole Miss and that is probably their most notable win this season (I don't consider Auburn an elite team with all of their problems right now). And Ole Miss was clearly looking ahead to Florida back then, as they always do. They've also beaten Rice, a team that has no defense, S.Carolina that can't cover as favorite and Miami of Ohio, which seems to be the worst MAC team this season. Vanderbilt schedule was not easy, but it wasn't as good as some would think either.
Mississippi State lost 4 games YTD but they were competitive against Auburn and kept it relatively close at LSU last week in a game that finally featured some offense from this Mississippi State team. They were upset at Louisiana Tech in week 1, in a game in which they were favored (who knows why?) and they were destroyed by the misterious Georgia Tech team. In their two home games they won against a division I-AA team and were beaten by 1 against Auburn. Their defense is solid and if their offense improves just a little bit on that game at LSU last week, they can win outright this Saturday.
The unbeaten road teams, with 4+ wins, favored by 2-3.5 pts are 12-36 ATS in last 48 games.
The third team that is ranked 77 places or better on the road and not favored by 20+ is Boise. I like this team, but I also like S.Miss despite their three straight losses. However, I only have a lean on SMiss in this game.
BOISE -11 @ SMISS
Lean: SMISS +11
Just like Ball State and Vandy, Boise should be favored by more than 11 if nothing else then because they are nationally ranked. But they are not, and it is a little bit easier to understand why.
S.Mississippi is 3-0 ATS in last three as underdog (twice this season + bowl game last year) and they haven't been a home dog since 2004 when they lost by 10 to Cal as 24.5 pts underdogs. They will be looking for some revenge here as they lost at Boise last year by the score of 38-16. It will be a night game for SMISS after a clear lookahead loss to UTEP last week in OT. They were clearly not in there mentally from start to finish as they were probably looking ahead to this biggie against Boise. The unbeaten teams with 4or 5 wins are 1-11 ats against 2-3 teams when favored by 8-14.5 pts. Boise is as usual a huge public play this week.
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