San Jose St/Eastern Michigan Over 56.5
Both of these offenses are pass-first, and both really struggled to run the ball last week, so don't be surprised to see both teams lean heavily on the pass game tonight. Pass heavy offenses lead to lots of clock stoppages, more possessions, higher turnover probability, etc. Weaver for SJSU looked super poised against USCs second string, leading 3 TD drives in the 4th quarter of that game last week. Same can be said for Noah Kim of EMU, who is in the argument for best QB in the MAC. Should be a back and forth game with whoever has the ball last having a chance to win it.
Purdue Boilermakers -35.5
I won't pretend that Purdue is going to be a good football team this year. They haven't won a Big 10 conference game in two years, and won 2 total games a year ago. But Barry Odom has brought in a ton of transfers and this team will be improved. But this is more of a fade of Indiana St. They aren't good for an FCS team, let alone able to compete with a Big 10 team. They last played a couple years ago, when Purdue was also terrible, and Purdue won 49-0. ISU had 58 rush yards last week vs SEMO, so against a vastly bigger, faster, stronger defensive front, they should get swallowed whole. Plus this is maybe the only game on Purdues schedule that is a guaranteed win, so they need some style points out of it.
Toledo/Michigan St Under 47.5 -110
Pat Fitzgerald takes over the head coaching duties in East Lansing, I'd imagine his philosophies from his 17 year tenure at Northwestern haven't left him. He's a defensive first coach, who wants to shorten the game, run the ball and clock, punch you in the mouth over and over again, and leave with a small margin of victory in a low scoring game. That's ideal for him. On the other side, Toledo had the 4th best overall defense in the country last year. Yes, that's helped by a weak MAC schedule, but still worth noting. In 15 career games vs MAC opponents, Fitz' teams have played 10 of those games under this number.
Miami FL/Stanford Over 47.5 -110
This number is scary low for me. I get that Miami has to travel as far as they probably can to play a football game on this continent, but it isn't like they have a bunch of youngsters leading the team. I'm not a Christobal guy by any means, but he usually has his guys ready, and tonight should be no different. Mensah will want to put on a show in his debut, and Toney has a Heisman campaign he needs to start tending to. Miamis biggest question mark will be how they replace what they lost on defense, and I think Stanford can contribute two scores or so help out. Something like 38-17.
Hot Forum Topics
