My Week 3 Saturday card. Earlier in the week, I was concerned as my card filled with favorites. I did find some underdogs, so here we go as follows:
West Virginia -3
Cincinnati -3
Northwestern -3
Boise State -4
Nevada -2.5
Baylor/Kansas O49 (bought 1/2 pt down)
Vanderbilt +13
Florida State +5
Minnesota +3
I really want to bet Nebraska +23. Seems like the whole world is on the Sooners. And Lincoln Riley's record ATS is terrible. Of course, this isn't your father's Nebraska, as this program has really dropped in overall talent.
Big 12 notes:
Baylor/Kansas - I'll be at this game tomorrow. This game has trap written all over it for Baylor. I do think Baylor will cover, but I'm not going to bet on it. In my preseason write-up, I called the Baylor the Wildcard in this league as I noted they could go anywhere from 1-8 to 8-1 in Big 12 play. I thought the QB play would be the difference maker either way. So far, I have been impressed with what I've seen and heard about QB Gerry Bohanon (esp what I've heard about his off-field demeanor). I think Baylor puts some points on the board and likely covers, but Kansas is playing a notch or two higher than in recent seasons. The conference opener at home for KU will have the home team excited to play and show their new stuff. I really like the hire of Lance Leipold for Kansas. They need some time.
West Virginia is an angle that I often use in college basketball, but I think it works in CFB as well. The unranked home team favored against the ranked visitor (Va Tech). WVU burned me on this last year against KSU. I'll go with the home favorite here.
There's a theory out there that says go with a team that has a star missing his first game with an injury as the other guys will rally around the guy filling in. I'm not sure how that works with K-State tomorrow, as there is plenty of film on Will Howard who will fill in for injured QB Skylar Thompson. Howard filled the same role last year where he compiled a 2-5 record as the starter (one of the wins was against Kansas), completed 54% of his passes, threw 8 TD's and 10 INT's. Meanwhile Nevada QB Carson Strong projects as a high first round draft pick in next year's NFL draft. Give me the better QB, and quite frankly, the better team.
Oklahoma State has come out of the gates struggling. A 7 pt win against FCS Missouri State, a 5 pt win vs Tulsa for 0-2 ATS. One does not take a trip to Boise to get well. I'm going with the home favorite.
Nothing of note in the other Big 12 games.
BOL everybody!