Week 8 of the college football season is upon us, following a Week 7 slate that turned out to be one of the wildest in recent memory. I’ll have a shorter card this week, backing a couple of underdogs as well as a pair of moneyline parlays I like for Saturday. I’m publishing on Thursday this week, so be sure to check back closer to the games for potential adds and updates.
LSU at Auburn (Saturday – 12pm ET)
Indiana at Michigan (Saturday – 12pm ET)
We have strong spots on a couple of road teams favored by about a touchdown in the early window on Saturday.
LSU is yet to win on the road this season, with single digit losses at Ole Miss and Kentucky. That needs to change now if the Tigers want to keep their College Football Playoff hopes alive. We have a good sell high spot on Auburn, coming off one of the program’s most unexpected regular season wins, as roughly a 20-point road underdog at No. 1 Georgia.
Prior to the win over the Bulldogs, Auburn had not been all that impressive. Against Power 4 competition, the Tigers snuck by a questionable Baylor team in Atlanta, lost to Florida and Tennessee, and got a pretty underwhelming home win over Vanderbilt. While Auburn woke up and erased a 14-0 deficit in Athens, it won’t be sneaking up against LSU this week.
I’ll take Auburn for what its been on the whole this season, and say that catching lightning in a bottle in the second half last week creates some value on LSU here. LSU smashed Texas A&M and Mississippi State by a combined score of 66-6 in its other SEC games. I think the road Tigers will be in control of this one.
I’d argue Indiana outplayed Ohio State last week, and lost by inches with a foot out of bounds on what would have been the game winning touchdown in the final minute. Now we get an angry Curt Cignetti off a loss and headed to Michigan. Michigan is riding the high of a comeback win over Penn State. Kyle Whittingham pulled the trigger on a quarterback change at halftime, and it worked.
Highly touted Bryce Underwood was benched when the Wolverines were getting shutout at halftime. Tommy Carr came in and led the offense to 21 points and the win. The element of surprise and the unknown of Carr really benefitted Michigan in that game. Now the Hoosiers have tape on Carr, and will be prepared for the matchup. Indiana is a very balanced team, and Michigan still has not proven that. The Hoosiers caused a ton of problems on defense for a high powered Ohio State offense. It should have a much easier time limiting the Wolverines on Saturday, regardless of who is at QB.
Michigan has a tough defense, but I trust Cignetti off a loss to have his team ready to start a new winning streak in Ann Arbor.
CFB Best Bet: LSU/Indiana ML Parlay (-120)
Baylor at Kansas (Saturday – 1pm ET)
Baylor looked like it may have turned a corner after an offensive explosion against Arizona State. The Bears came out of the bye at home against a TCU team yet to get a Power 4 win, but laid an egg. Baylor completed just 41% of its passes and scored six points in the loss. Outside of the ASU game, the offense has really struggled against Auburn, Colorado and TCU.
Now the Bears go on the road to face a Jayhawks squad that’s better than its record suggests, hungry for a win in the conference. Kansas has a significant advantage in yards per play offensively, while the defenses grade out pretty similar by the same metric. The Jayhawks’ only big home game came against Missouri, also as a home underdog. While they hung tough for a half, Missouri broke it open in the second half. But the Tigers are a significant step up in competition compared to Baylor.
Kansas is off consecutive road losses to Utah and Kansas State. It played the Wildcats tough as well, but blew a fourth quarter lead. Now the Jayhawks return home starved for a win, and get to face some competition that’s in their weight class. Lance Leipold is 9-5-1 ATS as a home underdog during his tenure, and I expect him to improve that record on Saturday afternoon.
CFB Best Bet: Kansas +3 (-110)
Iowa at Minnesota (Saturday – 3:30pm ET)
Houston at Utah (Saturday – 10:15pm ET)
Minnesota has a couple of wins as the underdog this season, but has been an inconsistent team overall. The Gophers got a win at Washington, but that has not aged well, along with a home win over Michigan. But Underwood was dreadful for the Wolverines in that one, and helped lead to his eventual benching last week.
Minnesota has also gotten steamrolled by Mississippi State at home, and most recently by Purdue on the road. Iowa is a far more consistent operation. When the Hawkeyes are out of their weight class, it shows — like the loss to Ohio State. But they’ve won the rest of their games, including common wins over Washington and Michigan, both on the road.
Kirk Ferentz also simply owns this matchup. Since P.J. Fleck took over at Minnesota in 2017, he’s just 1-8 against Iowa, including 0-4 at home. Ferentz’s domination of the Gophers goes back for decades, with Iowa going 10-1 in this matchup since 2015, and 20-5 since 2001.
Iowa has the better unit on both sides of the ball, and with each team off a bye, that should favor the better coach. I like the Hawkeyes to continue to be a bully in this matchup after winning the last two meetings by a combined score of 72-17.
College Game Day will be in Salt Lake City this week for the night cap. Utah is an impressive 6-0, including 5-1 ATS. Last week was the first time it didn’t completely dominate a game, squeaking by Colorado by three points. I think we can buy low on the Utes here.
Against FBS competition at home, Utah has beaten Arkansas, Utah State and Kansas by a combined score of 117-34. Houston represents a much tougher test, but will also be playing in a very hostile environment. While the Cougars did take Texas Tech down to the wire on the road, Utah has been far more impressive than the Red Raiders. The Utes show some very unique looks on offense that can confuse the Cougars on defense.
Houston is off a big home win in a ranked game against Oklahoma State, while we finally saw Utah have a poor showing in a lookahead spot. I like the bounce-back here at home.
CFB Best Bet: Iowa/Utah ML Parlay (-105)
USC at Wisconsin (Saturday – 7:30pm ET)
Wisconsin got shutdown offensively last week on the road against a very physical UCLA defense. The Badgers took money in the game, but wound up being the wrong side. UCLA is just a different animal, and I think the market was a week early on this team.
Now Wisco returns home for a big Saturday night primetime game on NBC. The offense should look much better in this atmosphere, particularly facing a USC defense that we’ve seen struggle at times. Both of these teams have a road win over Penn State, but USC was 0-3 ATS in Big Ten play prior to that. We saw the defense give up 41 points to an Oregon offense that has been a hot mess since, along with 35 points at a lifeless Rutgers program.
Struggling on the road, particularly going east, has been an issue for the Trojans. They got the win at Penn State this year, but prior to that Lincoln Riley was just 2-9 ATS on the road since USC became a member of the Big Ten. If we take the trend back to the final season of the PAC-12, Riley is 3-13 ATS on the road in USC’s last 16 road games prior to Penn State.
Wisco has played stronger competition this season, including neutralizing Notre Dame for a half. This will be the Badgers first chance to step up at home, and I expect them to do so.
CFB Best Bet: Wisconsin +3 (-110)
