Friday's Bowl Games - All 5 of them

[MicroBob]

Yiikes - Lots of games today.

2-1 yesterday.
7-5 so far playing every bowl-game.


Great weather so we decided to go to the Liberty Bowl today.
GF knows zero football. And her Dad speaks no english.
Even the whole bit about the marching-bands at halftime will be kind of weird to them.
Should be fun.

I'm taking:

UK +10
Oregon St -3.5
Houston +5.5
Maryland +1
Texas Tech -6.5

[MicroBob]

UK +10 - I just think that 10 points is an awful lot in this game.
Clemson only beat NCSt by 6 at home.
Early in the year they racked up a ton of points but that was mostly against teams like FAU (54-6), UNC (52-7), La Tech (51-0) and Temple (63-9).
Sure their offense is impressive. But I think it might be over-valued as their point totals against respectable teams are not really THAT high.
Still, they're playing the UK defense who can really get lit up. 42-40 win over La-Monroe for them really concerns me.
But 17-12 loss to Tennessee and 24-17 to South Carolina gives me hope.

Clemson may very well win by 30 points. but i think more than 50% of the time UK keeps this reasonable.
As I said, 10 points is a lot.

[MicroBob]

Oregon State -3.5 - Missouri really doesn't impress me a whole lot. They had a big illness that swept through the team in El Paso affecting 20+ players and a lot of their coaches. They've been feeling like crap and are still kind of recovering a bit.
I never know how good the Pac-10 is.
For every California who I think looks good there's a UCLA who really disappoint me. So I'm kind of giving up on trying to figure that out. But they did end the season pretty hot, including a win at Hawaii which I now think is a reasonable accomplishment.


Houston +5.5 - I think South Carolina must be the public choice here because they're from the SEC and have Spurrier. Not a lot of respect out there for the CUSA or for Houston.
The Cougars ended the season really hot winning their last 6 games.
Unfortunately, one of those wins was 23-20 at Memphis. And the Tigers were pathetic against EVERYBODY.
Houston also lost earlier this season to freaking La-Lafayette.

but in their 6-game win-streak they've been racking up the points and I think they can keep it close.
I'm going with my gut but wouldn't be surprised if I was horribly wrong.

[MicroBob]

Purdue impresses me NOT.
All 8 wins against teams with losing records:
Indiana St (1-11), Miami (Ohio) (2-10) in freaking overtime, Ball State (5-7), Minnesota (6-6), Northwestern (4-8), Michigan State (4-8), Illinois (2-10), Indiana (5-7).

All of their losses were mostly not close or unimpressive.
Notre Dame 35-21, Iowa 47-17, Wisconsin 24-3, Penn St 12-0, Hawaii 42-35.

Maryland lost their last 2 games to tough teams (BC, WF) ending the season on a bit of a sour note and I believe might be a bit undervalued as a result.

Mostly though, I just think Purdue isn't very good and that Maryland is the better team.


Texas Tech -6.5 - Minnesota impresses me about as much as Purdue. Minnesota's pass defense is one of the worst in the country. T-Tech passing offense is one of the best.
Minnesota was 6-6 this year which included a squeaker over North Dakota State. Minnie had a few blow-out losses including 42-17 to Calif, 48-12 to Wisconsin, 44-0 to OSU.

Texas Tech finished relatively strong going 3-2.
The losses were to Texas 35-31 and Okla 34-24. Not bad.
They beat Okla St 30-24 which isn't exactly a HUGE quality win but Okla St did have their moments today vs. Alabama.

Texas Tech is just so much better than Minnesota imo that I expect them to run-away with this often enough for them to be able to give up the 6.5 points.

[MyTurn2Raise]

x-posted from my pick thread
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Purdue/Maryland O50.5

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my only pick for Friday games as of know. Still value at 52.5. I'd lay off at 54 or higher.

Purdue is scoring just over 27 and allowing just under 27 a game. A closer look at the bowl teams they played is revealing.

27-21 W v Minnesota
21-35 L @ Notre Dame
17-47 L @ Iowa
3-24 L v Wisconsin
0-12 L v Penn St
35-42 L @ Hawaii

bowl teams are averaging over 30 per game verse the Boilers.
Maryland is only averaging 21 per game, but expect them to get near 30 verse the Boilers.

On the other side of the ball, Maryland did a good job stopping teams that didn't pass well this season, such as Miami and Clemson. However, all the pass happy teams, put up 20+ on Maryland. The Terps just don't have enough size, speed, and depth to cover multiple threats....see BC and FSU games.

The Terps allow 5.66 ypp and the Boilers allow 6.09 ypp [img]/images/graemlins/blush.gif[/img].

Maryland avg 5.13 ypp and Purdue 6.21 ypp.

Looks like a game near 60 points from all my calculations. My median expected game is 57.

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[arardor]

I am with you on UK and Oregon St. Both for the same reason. Both are playing games against teams going in the opposite direction. MU I have watched alot this year since I am in Big 12 land (KSU alumn). They started out 6 - 0 and everyone was starting to hype them up. They lost there DE to injury that really hurt the defense. They got physically manhandled by Texas A&M and it went into the pooper from there.

The controversial loss to Iowa State was the most telling for MU. It was a bad holding call at the end but they were playing the worst team in the Big 12 and shouldn't have been in that situation.

Oregon St on the other hand has won 6 of 7 I believe and has gotten stronger as the season progressed.

Clemson simply went into the tank after the huge win against Geogia Tech.

[inside??]

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I'm taking:

UK +10
Oregon St -3.5
Houston +5.5
Maryland +1
Texas Tech -6.5

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I was fortunate to go 4-0 yesterday. There doesn't seem to be stand out game today. I am taking:

Best Bet: Miss/OSU over 52-

Small plays on:
UK +10
Oregon St +3.5
Houston +6 (-120)
Maryland +1

Good Luck... Seems like the only one I am going against you on in the Miss/OSU game.


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[arardor]

UK +10
Oregon St -3.5
Houston +6 (-120)
Maryland +1

I parlayed these exact games so I hop you go 4 and 0 again.

[sfwusc]

I will be at the Liberty Bowl as well.

I picked

2U SC -6 +101
1.5U UK +9.5
1 U UK Moneyline

Betting with my heart. GO [censored] and Go Wildcats.

I agree with the Wildcats pick. Bowden is making excuse (reasons they could lose) for a loss pregame. He did this before he played the [censored]. Otherwise I can't remember him doing this.

I think SC wins this game. I dont see us blowing them out, but we should win this game by atleast a TD. The line has moved in Houston's favor. I think SC will have more fans here as well, based on downtown Memphis.

CUSA is not very good.

-SFWUSC

[NajdorfDefense]

I'm against you on SoCar and Minny, but am leaning Kentucky but will likely pass on that one. Feels like a SoCar blowout perhaps today.