Week 8 SEC Picks and College Football Best Bets

Best Bet

Evan: USF @ UConn – I told myself I was not going back to the well with the Bulls, but here I am. After an absolute stinker last week against Florida Atlantic, USF desperately needs this win for Coach Alex Golesh to get his very young team to a bowl game in the very early steps of a full program rebuild. UConn is a perennial cellar dweller in the FBS, so the Bulls simply need to handle business here against a team they should absolutely handle if USF is the program it believes it can be. USF -1.5

Justin: Army @ No. 19 LSU – LSU is giving 30 points this week against Army. LSU has a really bad defense, so Army is going to find a way to just keep their offense on the field for like 40 minutes of this game. They’re going to keep drives alive three and four yards at a time. LSU is barely going to get the opportunity to score 30 points, much less cover 30 points. LSU will win, but covering this big of a number seems like a tall order. Army +30

Ethan: North Texas @ No. 23 Tulane – I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of my best bets betraying me. And this is why I enjoy the sport as a fan and not as a gambler. Because I would lose so much money if I tried betting on things. Anyway, I’m fascinated with North Texas this week. The Mean Green has a great offense and I love the coach they hired (I am also a big fan of Seth Littrell as well, by the way). Meanwhile, Tulane hasn’t exactly proven to be capable of scoring a ton of points up to this point in the season. Tulane probably wins this one, but they’re favored by 20 points. That spread seems a bit extreme. North Texas +20

Andrew: No. 22 Air Force @ Navy –  We know how this goes at this point. I pick a disgusting under, and those teams suddenly discover offensive football. It’s happened all 3 times I’ve done it. At some point, I will quit doing this. But I am a man of principle. And there is one principle you always follow when betting on CFB: SERVICE ACADEMY UNDERS. Since 2005 in games between the service academics, the under is 42-10-1.

It’s pretty simple. You get a pair of option teams that already want to play as slow as possible, running the ball every play for four yards a carry, facing each other. And the defenses face this stuff every day in practice. They know how to stop it. The results are absurdly low totals. Now we may not get this for Army-Navy later this year, as Army has gone away from the classic Flexbone. But for Air Force-Navy? It still applies. Air Force-Navy UNDER 35.0

Ryan: Washington State @ No. 9 Oregon – Washington State is on a borderline free fall right now. Oregon is coming off of a loss that they should feel like they gave away instead of straight-up lost. I think Lanning has his team fired up and ready to make a statement that last week was a fluke and rolls through Washington State. Oregon -20.5

John: No. 24 Iowa @ Minnesota – I’m still upset that my obvious pick last week ended up being an outright loss, but we keep trucking along this week. There has been a lot of talk this year about the Iowa OC needing to average 25 points per game in order to keep his job, and now that we’re several weeks into the season and he’s already come in below that mark, he needs to up that average to 29.83 points the rest of this season.

The total in the Iowa vs Minnesota game is 30.5, so he pretty much needs to hit the over just in Iowa points to stay on track. Lucky for him, defensive touchdowns still count for his total for some reason, and the Minnesota QB has thrown as many interceptions as touchdowns so far this season. The O/U is just soooo low in this game that it’s almost impossible for this to not make the over, and I think we may see a defensive touchdown or two to help seal it. Iowa-Minnesota OVER 30.5