The major programs get most of the headlines, but real college football fans love watching the Group of Five conference play. Here are some of the best ways to attack the Group of Five futures market on DraftKings Sportsbook.
Group of Five College Football Betting Preview
It is a huge year for the Group of Five conferences. A Group of Five team is guaranteed a playoff spot for the first time ever. The Group of Five playoff spot will go to the highest-ranked conference champion. You can’t rule anyone out, but it’s hard to imagine a team from the MAC being the highest-ranked team. Every other conference has at least one team with a chance but I will run through the likelihood of each conference and which teams are the best bets to win those conferences.
For a quick overview, here are the Group of Five teams with the best odds to make the College Football Playoff at DraftKings Sportsbook:
Boise State (+400); Liberty (+400); Memphis (+700); Tulane (+1000); App State (+1000); Texas State (+1200); UTSA (+1200)
American Athletic Conference
Favorites to win the AAC: Memphis (+220); Tulane (+310); UTSA (+450); South Florida (+650)
The American has been regarded as the best Group of Five conference over the past few years. In 2021, Cincinnati became the only Group of Five team to make the College Football Playoff. In 2022, Tulane was the highest-ranked Group of Five team. Last season, SMU was in the AAC and one of only two teams to be ranked in the final CFP Top 25 rankings. Based on how the playoff committee values strength of schedule, the AAC has a big advantage.
Despite the AAC being the top conference overall, Memphis only has the third-best odds to make the Playoff because of the difficulty of their schedule. The Tigers return star QB Seth Henigan and brought in some good transfers, including RB Mario Anderson from South Carolina. If all goes according to plan, they will have one of the best offenses in the country. The question marks for this team are on the defensive side of the ball.
Schedule-wise, they play Florida State on the road, which is actually a good thing. If they win the game, they are in the driver’s seat to earn this playoff spot. If they even play them close, the committee will credit them for playing a tough game against a highly-ranked team. However, in conference play, they need to play on the road against the other top teams in the conference: Tulane, UTSA and South Florida.
I am willing to buy on the upside of what Memphis could be. If they improve some on defense, they will be the best team in this conference and go 11-1 with a loss to Florida State, giving them a very strong case to earn this playoff spot. You could bet on them to win the conference, but I am willing to take the value on them hitting their full potential and being good enough to make the College Football Playoff.
Best Bet: Memphis to Make the Playoff (+700)
Conference USA
In 2023, Liberty finished as the highest-ranked Group of Five team and would have made the playoff under the new rules. Liberty is the overwhelming favorite to win the conference again this year at -200. Western Kentucky (+450) and Jacksonville State (+550) are the only teams remotely close to the Flames. Liberty returns its star quarterback, Kaidon Salter, who was voted Group of Five Player of the Year by several publications. Under Head Coach Jamey Chadwell, Liberty should be incredibly explosive on offense again.
After Liberty, this conference isn’t particularly strong this year. This works both for and against Liberty in their path to the Playoff. Liberty has a real chance to go undefeated, with their toughest game being an out-of-conference road game against Appalachian State. In conference, they get to play the only other competitive teams, Jacksonville State and Western Kentucky, at home. If Liberty goes undefeated and is the only undefeated conference champion, they will have a good case to make the Playoff. However, only one loss with this easy schedule could disqualify them.
Liberty will win this conference, but they will slip up somewhere, most likely against Appalachian State or potentially in the C-USA Championship Game. Due to their schedule, this would likely put them on the outside looking in.
Elsewhere in this conference, I do see one team struggling mightily. Head Coach Sonny Cumbie is about to embark on his third year in charge of Louisiana Tech. The Bulldogs have gone 3-9 in both seasons with Cumbie at the helm. They have done very little to improve this team this offseason, and they will struggle again. Their schedule only has two games where they will likely be favorites, against UTEP and Kennesaw State. It is hard to see this team winning over three or four games, so I am betting their win total to go under.
Best Bet: Louisiana Tech u5 wins (-125)
Mountain West
Boise State is the defending Mountain West champion. It was a bizarre season for the Broncos, as they fired Head Coach Andy Avalos in November. Then Spencer Danielson stepped in as interim head coach and turned their season around. Winning a conference title was enough to secure Danielson the full-time head coaching gig.
Boise State is favored to win the conference again at -120, while UNLV (+400) and Fresno State (+650) look to be their main competition. Frankly, when it comes to the Mountain West, I am only interested in the Broncos. They are head and shoulders above the rest of the conference and will be in the mix to make the College Football Playoff.
Ashton Jeanty is the best running back in the Group of Five and one of the best in the entire country. This is also one of the best offensive line groups in the Group of Five, and they return a ton of production. At quarterback, Maddux Madsen won the starting job over USC transfer Malachi Nelson. Madsen can run this offense proficiently, and having Nelson there is a great insurance policy.
Defensively, Boise State struggled a lot last season, but its defense was very young. They return a huge bulk of their production from last season, and those guys now have a season of experience under their belts and should be massively improved this year.
From a schedule perspective, things work out nicely for Boise State. They should have a really strong strength of schedule compared to other Group of Five teams. They face Oregon out of conference and get Oregon State and Washington State, who are playing a partial Mountain West schedule. The Broncos get Oregon State and Washington State at home, so if they can win both of those games and go 11-1 with their only loss to Oregon, they will almost certainly be the Group of Five team picked for the College Football Playoff.
Best Bet: Boise State to Make the Playoff (+400)
Mid-American Conference
The two best quarterbacks in the MAC, Kurtis Rourke (Ohio) and Dequan Finn (Toledo), both transferred away this offseason. That leaves this conference even more wide open than it normally is. There is no conference more unpredictable than the MAC. For the past four years, they have had four different conference champions. It is usually a good idea to bet against the favorites in this conference because there is always so much chaos.
When looking at the top-tier of teams, you have Miami (OH) (+250), Toledo (+280), N. Illinois (+650), W. Michigan (+650) and Bowling Green (+700) at odds better than 10/1 to win the MAC. I am immediately throwing out Miami (OH) and Toledo due to the lack of value in the numbers. So the pool of teams to dive deeper into is N. Illinois, W. Michigan and Bowling Green.
Bowling Green has the highest potential ceiling of those three teams. They have multiple stars, including RB Terion Stewart, TE Harold Fannin Jr. and safety CJ Brown. Head Coach Scot Loeffler has been allowed to build this program up the right way from one of the worst teams in college football to a real MAC contender. This year they could finally get over the hump and win the whole thing.
Best Bet: Bowling Green to win the MAC (+700)
Sun Belt
There is a group of five teams at the top of the Sun Belt with odds of +850 or better to win the conference (App State +275; Texas State +400; Louisiana +600; James Madison +750; South Alabama +850). App State has an elite offense led by their QB Joey Aguilar but has major question marks on defense. Texas State is in the same boat after acquiring QB Jordan McCloud in the transfer portal from JMU. They have a very exciting offense but major issues on defense. South Alabama and Louisiana went 6-6 last season, and neither is ready to make the jump yet.
There are many competitive teams in this conference, but unfortunately, they will cannibalize each other. Therefore, they will not have a playoff team, and a team with longer odds could be the conference champion. That said, I am taking the value of JMU to win the conference.
The Dukes lost their head coach, quarterback, and a huge number of players to the transfer portal after Curt Cignetti left for Indiana. However, they nailed their hire of Head Coach Bob Chesney. Chesney has won at every stop in his career, and they brought in a very talented quarterback, Dylan Morris, from Washington. Besides traveling to App State, JMU has a very favorable schedule. That game may be their only conference loss, so even if they lose that game, they would just need App State to lose two conference games to finish ahead of them in the Sun Belt East standings.
Elsewhere in the conference, I am worried about ULM. The Warhawks only won two games last season and went 0-8 in conference play. The Sun Belt is still very competitive, and ULM is still a very bad team. They have a brutal out-of-conference schedule, having to play both Texas and Auburn. Their season opener against Jackson State is the only game you can chalk up as a win. I don’t see how this team wins more than that game and maybe one conference game that they steal.
Best Bet: ULM u2.5 wins (-160); JMU to win the Sun Belt (+750)
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