A battle for bowl eligibility will be taking place across this Week 14 college football matchup between the Penn State Nittany Lions and the Rutgers Scarlet Knights. It has been a rapid fall for the Nittany Lions, who looked to be on the pathway to a true National Championship contender in the early stages of the season.
Looking at the odds, Penn State enters as a 14-point favorite and holds -625 odds on the moneyline on DraftKings Sportsbook of winning outright. Rutgers holds +455 odds of pulling off the upset, with the game total set at 55.5 points.
This article provides a preview of both teams and offers a pick for the Week 14 matchup.
Penn State vs. Rutgers prediction, preview
Penn State Nittany Lions
Penn State has slipped to 5-6 on the season, but snapped a six-game losing streak with back-to-back wins over Michigan State and Nebraska over the past two weeks. They are 4-7 against the spread, and the over has cashed in seven of their 11 games. James Franklin has already been sent packing, and Drew Allar suffered a season-ending injury. The floor for this season felt above their current outlook, but this is the reality.
The Nittany Lions are averaging 31.0 points per game, which ranks 45th in the country. They are generating 345.5 total yards of offense, including 166.4 per game on the ground. Penn State is holding opponents to 20.1 points per contest, which ranks 28th, and 316.3 total yards of offense.
Ethan Grunkemeyer has stepped in at quarterback following Allar’s injury. He has completed 67.5% of his pass attempts for 870 passing yards, five touchdowns, and four interceptions. Regardless of who is under center, Penn State is a run-first football team. Kaytron Allen headlines the rushing attack with 1,077 yards on the ground and a Big Ten-leading 14 rushing scores. Nicholas Singleton has added 463 rushing yards and 11 rushing scores of his own. Trebor Pena has a team-high 416 receiving yards and a touchdown, while Devonte Ross leads the team with five receiving scores along with 388 yards through the air.
Rutgers Scarlet Knights
Rutgers enters with a 5-6 record after getting blown out by Ohio State 42-9 last week. Bowl eligibility remains alive with a victory, and this is more on the table than most would expect in this matchup. The Scarlet Knights are 5-6 against the spread, and the over has cashed in six of the 11 games this season.
Athan Kaliakmanis stands in at quarterback for Rutgers. The Minnesota transfer has completed 61.2% of his pass attempts for 2,786 yards, 17 touchdowns, and seven interceptions. KJ Duff is the team’s leading receiver with 957 yards and six scores. Ian Strong adds 725 receiving yards and five touchdowns, while DT Sheffield has 550 yards through the air and four trips to pay-dirt. Antwan Raymond is the team’s leading rusher with 1,052 rushing yards and 12 touchdowns.
As a team, Rutgers ranks 68th in the country in scoring at 28.0 points per game. They are averaging 395.6 total yards per matchup, with 259.5 of these coming through the air. Defensively, opponents are scoring 31.1 points per game, which ranks 116th out of the 136 D1 teams, along with 425.9 total yards of offense.
Penn State vs. Rutgers pick, best bet
My lean is toward 14 points being too many for Penn State to clear and for Rutgers to cover the +14. But I am backing the under of 55.5 total points in this matchup, which feels like far too many based on the context of these teams.
Both sides enter with a 1,000+ yard rusher and content keeping the ball on the ground, eating up clock in the process. Penn State is on its backup quarterback, with Grunkemeyer only having passed for over 185+ yards through the air once over his past five starts. He is averaging 153.0 passing yards across this stretch with just four total passing touchdowns.
On the other side of the matchup, Kaliakmanis was held to just 81 passing yards last week against Ohio State. Penn State is not quite in the tier of defense as the Buckeyes, but they will offer far more resistance than most of Rutgers’ opponents this season. The Scarlet Knights were limited to just nine points last week, and also finished with 13 against Illinois, 10 against Oregon, and 19 against Washington over the past six weeks.
The total has gone under in five of Penn State’s last seven games, as well as six of Rutgers’ last eight. Looking at matchups between these two programs, the under has hit in four of the last five head-to-head matchups, with Rutgers failing to score more than 14 points in any of these games. Expect this to be a battle in the trenches and for neither team to have a clear path to clearing 30+ points. Count on this total to fall under the 55.5-point margin as the opponents scrap for the respective bowl eligibility.
