College Football Picks 2008 Week 8; Part 4: Mitch’s Free Predictions
In case you didn’t realize it I don’t like the Thursday games too much and they don’t seem to like me.
I felt more than a little uneasy about yesterday night’s picks and I made sure I added a special paragraph to my blog and talked about it on my video as to why I don’t pick as well when it comes to the weekday games as in most cases they are game I wouldn’t even pick if they were on a Saturday,well at least 2/3 of them are past us this week and with just tonight’s game (another one I really am not thrilled about) to go before the weekend we’ll have some work to do though I feel pretty good about the picks.
Barring any drastic line moves that we always cover on Saturdays, these are it my last set of picks for this week aside from those that will be emailed out in my free newsletter, so lets get on with them.
Boise State -23 1/2 Vs. Hawaii (Friday 10/17/08, 8 EST) 5 out of 10
I’m not so sure how familiar we would be with Boise State if they didn’t play so often during weeknights but it doesn’t matter as they seem to be one of those 5 or 6 teams we see all the time. When we last saw Boise they were scoring fairly effortlessly against Louisiana Tech in an easy cover at home laying 1/2 point more than they are laying in this game. We get to see Hawaii fairly often as well as they are usually the last game of the day and late bight Saturday in games that may actually start on Sunday for those of you in the Eastern Time Zone. Both teams enter this game coming off of a streak of covers with Boise covering it’s last 3 in a row and Hawaii covering its last 2.
While Boise State is always seen as an offensive team, especially when playing at home on the blue turf, they actually have the 8th best scoring defense in the country. Of course the offense is loaded at the skill positions and they stock a rotation where everyone seems to get plenty of quality touches. Hawaii near the bottom of every offensive and defensive category including 94th against the run, 98th in points allowed, 91st in rushing yards gained, and 88th in points scored. The spread represents the statistical mismatch the game is and the only real question is if Boise scores enough to cover, I think they do. Boise is just a tough place to play and Hawaii isn’t especially strong once they leave the Big Island covering just once in their last 6 road trips. I look for Boise to score enough to cover.
Michigan State +3 Vs. Ohio State (Saturday 10/18/08, 3:30 EST) 5 out 10
Both of these teams enter the game at 6-1 overall and 3-0 in their conference. Both suffered what can only be described as “bad” losses on visits to the West Coast but have rebounded decently. While neither team has an offense that really ranks among the best, they have both made up for their offensive deficiencies the same way, taking the ball away and giving their offense decent field position to work with. As we see so often turnovers are the biggest difference in close match ups and both of these teams excel in that category. While most of what we hear is about for Ohio State is about a few of their offensive players, the Buckeyes offense doesn’t rank in the top half of any major category except for rushing yards, their defense ranks in the top 20 in just about every major category. For Michigan State there numbers are even and moderate and when you see the +10 in the take away department next to their over all numbers you can see just how important the turnovers are to them.
While Ohio State has been winning their games they have been horrible against the spread going just 1-5 against the number. Michigan State is 4-3 against the spread so far this season going up against a little lighter competition. The Buckeyes have dominated this series covering 5 of the last 7 times out and the favorite has covered in 4 of the last 5. I’m luke warm on the Spartans as my 5 rating suggests and I know they’ll need to play a perfect game and force turnovers to win but I think they get it done in East Lansing this week.
Northwestern -4 Vs. Purdue (Saturday 10/18/08, 12 EST) 6 out of 10
Northwestern let last weeks game against Michigan State get away from them early by turning the ball over and setting up the Spartans for some pretty quick and easy scores thus starting the game in a hole they never got out of despite finishing with decent numbers overall. For Purdue they haven’t played well since the home loss to Oregon and have dropped their last 3 in a row. Surprisingly both QB’s in this match up have thrown more interceptions than touchdowns but I don’t believe that is where this game will be won for the Wildcats. I look for Northwestern to exploit the Boilermaker rushing defense which is ranked 100th in the country by running at them and controlling the ball. This should open up passing lanes for CJ Bacher to work with.
There isn’t a lot to work with in the trend department regarding either of these teams except that Purdue has done well at Northwestern but even that doesn’t mean much this year. Northwestern isn’t a team that is going to be good year in and year out, they are a team that builds and then tries to put together a nice run every few years. If the run doesn’t work out as planned its usually back to the drawing board and another cycle begins; this looks to be a year Northwestern has it together and a win Saturday will make them bowl eligible. Purdue on the other hand woud have wanted nothing more than to send Joe Tiller out a winner and get to a bowl but it doesn’t look to be in the cards. Instead the team has looked just outright bad at times and this poor play has been magnified on the road. WHile they managed to cover last week in Columbus it wasn’t pretty and it could have easily been a blow out if the Buckeyes didn’t continually stub their toe. I look for Northwestern to get it done this week and cover.
Northern Illinois -9 1/2 Vs. Toledo (Saturday 10/18/08, 4 EST) 7 out of 10
Congratulations to Tom Amstutz and his Toledo Rockets on their win last week at the Big House. While we all know this is a down year for the Wolverines it’s still a huge win as its the first time any MAC team has ever walked out of Ann Arbor with a win. Northern Illinois was in control of last week’s game against Miami of Ohio from opening kickoff to the final gun but just never got into that cover range in a game they could have easily covered. I think this week both teams return to earth and get back to what they do and for Northern Illinois this year it’’s been covering the spread as they have done 5 of 6 times this season. Toledo on the other hand hasn’t been very good losing at home to FIU and then being shut out the following week against Ball State.
Northern Illinois brings into this game one of the better defenses around and I feel that will be the biggest difference in this game. Toledo’s offense isn’t much to speak of and their defense gives up a lot of yards and points and ranks north of 100 in both of those categories. Toledo has absolutely dominated this series and to be honest it hasn’t even been competitive when coveing the spread. The Rockets have covered 8 of the last 9 times these teams have met and the last 4 times they have visited the Huskies. So why am I on Northern? Last year was a really bad year for the Huskies who are normally a bowl team and pretty decent and Toledo put 70 points on them, you can bet Northern hasn’t forgotten and will have some major revenge in mind. This year the tables are turned as far as the quality of their teams and while I don’t think Northern Illinois scores 70 I do think they cover easily at home.
If you would like more free picks and analysis like this be sure to sign up for my free newsletter. Its free, quick, and easy to sign up and it will also allow you to enter my weekly free picking contest. The letter will go out either late tonight (Friday) or Early Tomorrow (Saturday) but in plenty of time to catch the games it will cover. The games are going to be Texas-Missouri and Oklahoma-Kansas which has the earlier start at 3:30 EST so if you sign up by 3:15 EST you will still get this week’s letter. Even if you don’t sign up in time for this weeks you will still get all of the future weekly letters as well as the instructions and games for the picking contest which will go out on Tuesday nights.
I’ll be back tomorrow talking about all of the big line moves in this week’s games.
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Comments
Mitch,
I like a few of your picks for this week…not sold on the majority though. I was against you on both yesterday…thank goodness. It’s a favorites week this week…probably the best of the year so far. I really like Texas, Oklahoma (Kansas will get run out of the building when they pull their weekly first half no show), Georgia, Illinois, Oklahoma St. (won’t lose till Oklamoma game), Oregon St., USC (they could cover with their starters sitting the whole game) and Ohio St. Only a few underdogs I’m touching: Arkansas, VaTech, Ole Miss. Wouldn’t touch LSU/S. Carolina, N’western/Purdue, AZ/Cal, UCONN/Rutgers, FAU/WKU if they were the only games for the weekend. I really don’t like the Air Force and Troy picks at all. I can see a lot of value in teasing many of the 3, 4 and 5 point underdogs with the favorites I mentioned above too. This is the week to take advantage of!!!
Well the Texas and Oklahoma games will be in the newsletter so i’ll share my thoughts there. I’m leaning with you on Okie St. Zona is one of my stronger plays this week, you’ll see. WKU is awful.
Air Force and Troy are easy money, I hope :)
I hope to see you in the contest. It will be fun to see how everyone stacks up when they have to pick a lot of games like I do, not all, just a lot. More on the rules in the newsletter.
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