Point Blank – October 16
A Visitor’s “Homecoming”
The old notion of asking for a college team to play better on Homecoming week generally does not produce much from an ATS standpoint – in truth because for many of the teams on the board, it is difficult to tell that week from any other home game, especially the higher-tier conferences where sellouts are common But when it is the visiting team that is having a “homecoming” of sorts, it may be time to pay some added attention. That is the case when unbeaten Marshall goes to Miami to face Florida International on Saturday.
One of the keys to turning the Marshall program around was the hiring of Doc Holliday as head coach, and the recruiting pipeline into Florida that came along with him. Holliday served as associate head coach and recruiting coordinator with Urban Mayer for several years at the University of Florida, before a second stint with West Virginia University back in his home state. Holliday recruited Florida particularly well for the Mountaineers, and that has carried over – in his fifth season, thus the first in which every member of the Thundering Herd was brought on board by him, there are 29 players from Florida on the roster. There are nine starters on that list (if we include nickel CB Corey Tindal, since the defense often opens in that package), and 20 from the two-deep. Many of them are from Miami, including QB Rakeem Cato and WR Tommy Shuler, designated as offensive co-captains this week.
Naturally, this matters. It is one thing to come “home” and play in front of friends and family most seasons, but this time the intensity is turned up for Marshall - there is a legitimate chance to be 13-0 heading into what could be a major bowl appearance. Cato also has a chance to do something special in front of some home-town fans – a TD pass this week would be the 39th consecutive game he has thrown one, which would set a new NCAA record.
There is more to the Cato story. His birth father will be in attendance on Saturday, having completed a 20-year prison sentence, as well as the next generation. His take – “That’s a blessing. My daughter will be there. My father will be there. My family and friends. There will be people from there, and people from here, at the game to support me.”
And it is not as though friends and family of Marshall players will find getting tickets to be all that difficult – even in FIU’s local showdown against Florida Atlantic a couple of weeks ago, the attendance was only 12,544. It means that not only will the Thundering Herd have a little extra focus for this trip, but that when measuring the decibels of cheers during the game, there may not be any way of telling which was really the “home” team. Hence, given the Golden Panthers any shading in the line at all for the venue may be improper.
So is it enough for Marshall to work from an ATS standpoint? There is much to like, except for that one caveat that has been referred to multiple times in the Monday NCAA re-caps in this column – Holliday has actually been going out of his way to hold scores down this season, largely to keep his team fresh for what will be a 14-game campaign. The Herd led Ohio 41-0 in the third quarter of a game that finished 44-14; it was 41-3 after three quarters at Akron before a 48-17 final; 56-7 after three quarters vs. Old Dominion before ending 56-14; and after they scored on the first play of the fourth quarter vs. Middle Tennessee State last week to make it 49-17, it was 7-0 for the Blue Raiders the rest of the way. What is most intriguing is that even after letting up in each of those games, Marshall covered the spread by a combined 54.5 points anyway. Does it make sense to look at a First Half wager, to avoid the possibility of Holliday holding back again? Even that brings a precaution – he has chosen to defer the option each time his team has won the toss this season. But even with the opposition having the ball first in all five lined games, it has still been a 4-1 ATS run through those First Half cycles, the Thundering Herd winning by a combined 156-30 on the scoreboard. Plenty of food for thought.
In the Sights…
There is a lot of of interesting stuff before we get to Saturday this week, and in particular something worth putting under the microscope for Friday night. Temple has been a fascinating team to watch with P. J. Walker at QB, flying far beneath the radar screens of the betting markets. He did not see much action in the early part of his freshman season LY, appearing in one series over four games, but when the Owls were getting drubbed by Louisville in Game #5, on their way to an 0-5 opening, he was handed the reigns, and played pretty well off the bench. Since then it has been his show, and while Temple only went 2-5 SU in his seven starts to close out the campaign, it was a 6-1 ATS run, with the offense averaging 31.4 points per game. The Owls beat the spread by 63.5 points across those seven contests.
So far this season it has been a 4-1 SU and 2-2 ATS opening (no line vs. Delaware State), including confidence boosting wins of 37-7 at Vanderbilt and 36-10 at Connecticut. Walker has continued to be the spark, making plays without a whole lot of support at the skill positions. But that is where it gets interesting this week, with transfers Colin Thompson (Florida) and Keith Kirkwood (Hawaii) now ready to become factors. Both got on the field for the first time on Saturday, and only saw limited action vs. Tulsa, but do not be surprised if they are soon big parts of the rotation.
Thompson is from Philadelphia, attending Archbishop Wood, and helped lead that school to its first ever PIAA championship as a senior, before signing with Florida as a 4* recruit (both ESPN and Scout had him rated as the #2 TE in the country). Meanwhile Kirkwood, from Neptune, New Jersey (only about 75 miles from Philly), caught 12 passes for 250 yards and a TD as a freshman at Hawaii, and just became eligible under a hardship waiver last week (though he had been practicing with the team since arriving on campus this summer). They give Walker some nice options to work with, players that NFL scouts will be watching in the years to come, and at the current market prices (+7.5 and 49.5, though a shopper can get to +8 and 49 as of this writing), a combination of Temple and Over vs. Houston only requires 21 points from the Owls to be guaranteed no worse than a split. Think of it this way – a half unit on both Temple and Over brings you a significantly better chance of going 2-0 than 0-2, with an Under result squeezing Houston’s window, and the Owls reaching 21 is a plateau at which only vigorish can be lost.