NCCAF Week 9 Predictions:

This week I’ll be posting free pick inside of this blog entry through out the week. I recommend continuing to check back as well as staying tuned through out the day on Saturday for any potential late additions. For the 2007 season my posted free college football picks have gone 26-18 for +13.62 units. For the most part the bigger 1-3 unit plays have won and the ½ unit plays have made up the majority of the losses. Lets get right into it with the our week 9 college football predictions.

Initial entry: Monday 3:15AM EST October 22, 2007 – Week 9 NCAAF Early Line Edition

Best Bet of the Week: Boston College +3.5 @ Virginia Tech
This game carries the most BCS implications this week and is a great way to kick off NCAAF Week 9 as this is a Thursday night game.

Let’s start by putting each team’s season into perspective.

Virginia Tech started the season as the #9 ranked team in the country but dropped to #18 after being beat up week 2 by LSU, this was a game where they were distracted however dealing with emotional off the field issues. Since then they’ve went on to win 5 games in a row with most of them being against cupcake teams but did pull of a nice home victory against Clemson in this span. VT has gone just 2-4 ATS on the season including 0-3 at home yet somehow has managed to find themselves back in the top 10 and a slot higher than they started the season. What a strange college football season it’s been where underachieving teams continue to climb in the rankings thanks to all these major upsets.

Boston College started the season unranked and has managed reach the drivers seat. Their eyes are now clearly set on the National Championship but they have quite the test ahead of them and are certainly a substantial underdog to finish the season in the top 2. Other than an impressive win on the road at Georgia Tech they really don’t have many other key wins. I’d still consider them a team that has achieved much better than expectation, I mean its hard not to, with them being 7-0, ranked #2 in the BCS and having a 4-2 ATS on the season.

Take all this ranking stuff and put it aside because it’s really meaningless as far as this match up goes. It’s really hard to get a handle on how good either of these two teams is right now so let’s look closer at the match up.

These teams have yet to play a common opponent so we have nothing to look at there.

The Boston College defense certainly had an edge against the VT offense. Boston College is #1 against the run but they have a mediocre (lower than average) pass defense. The good thing for Boston College the Hokies are not a great passing team. This match up here certainly favors the BC Eagles.

On the other side of the ball things are a bit Neutral. We have a good Boston College passing team facing off against a decent VT passing defense. As far as the run game is concerned the edge certainly goes the Virginia Tech defense.
This is the type of game where the pass should open up the run for Boston College but look for them to be primarily passing in this game. If BC continues their trend of shutting down the run they’ll force the Hokies to play primarily a passing game which will be a big problem. I see the game going similar to the way the Boston College Georgia Tech game went (that one was a much more dominating performance than the score board showed) but not quite as dominate. I like Boston College to get the road win here or at least to cover the spread.

As far as personnel goes both teams should be well rested as both had a week 8 bye. This rest was much more important for VT who has injury concerns.

While it’s really difficult to get an idea right now how good either of these teams actually is. I feel the match up slightly favors the Boston College Eagles. I would set this line as BC -2 on a Neutral field. Is the home field advantage for VT worth 5.5 points? When you’re 0-3 ATS at home on the season facing one of the Nations top teams how much can home field advantage be worth? My answer to that is: 3.5 point at best and probably 3 is a more accurate number.
Right now every sportsbook has Boston College +3 but TheGreek has a unique line of +3.5. I’m recommending this play as a 1.5 unit play +3 or better. And as a .75 unit play if you get on late and the line happens to be +2.5 or worst (unlikely).
My play:
Boston College +3.5 -110 TheGreek 1.65u to win 1.5u

Oregon -2.5 vs USC
The only reason this line is not Oregon -6.5 is because USC has been a dominate team for so long. I don’t recall off the top of my head the last time USC was ever an underdog. Perhaps Vegas just expects USC to get action because this line is truly odd to me. I expect this one to sharpen up a lot through out the week. I’ll recommend Oregon as a 1.5 unit play at -3 or better and a 1 unit play at -4 or better. At -2.5 you have nothing to lose in terms of line movements. I would suggest jumping on the Ducks here as soon as possible. The only loss the Ducks have this season was in a game against then #8 ranked Cal in a close game that could have really gone either way. Oregon has a tough test ahead but if they win out (next 2 games key) unless there is 2 undefeated teams I think it would be a huge injustice for them not to be in the National Championship game. In any case I won’t go into all the details here but I’ve got USC as a 7.5 point favorite in this game on a neutral field (I didn’t expect the line to be -10.5 or anything, but no way I thought it would be so low).
My play
Oregon -2.5 -110 (Diamond Sportsbook) 1.65u to win 1.5u

I also have a couple ½ unit plays I like on the early lines
Mississippi +17.5 -105 (Pinnacle) 0.53u to win 0.5u
Maryland +3.5 -105 (Bet Jamaica) 0.53u to win 0.50u

I’ll certainly be making updates to this post by very early Saturday morning hours. Any updates will go below this line and will be time dated. Please check back later for additional picks or thoughts.

Update 7:05 PM EST Friday Night (October 26)

This is a late add on and I don’t have a lot of time for a right up. This game kicks off in an hour. I’m recommending Boise State -2.5 -115 for 1 unit tonight. This line is available at TheGreek by purchasing a 1/2 point. If you can’t purchase a 1/2 point at your book for less than -115 play -3 -110 or better. Pinnacle has -3 -103 right now, Bet Jamaica has -3 -102.

Update 1:40 PM EST Saturday (October 27)

A few more add ons.

Florida -6.5 | 1.2u to win 1u (Bet Jamaica w/ 1/2 point buy)
Nebraska +21 | 1.1u to win 1u (Bodog)
Rice +8.5 | 0.5u to win 0.5u (Pinnacle)

Update 2:35 PM EST Saturday (October 27)

UCONN +4.5 | 0.55u to win 0.5u (Bodog)

Note: I was getting ready two times here to condense my notes into write ups for these late add-on picks I posted within the last hour. I had a couple thngs come up and am getting distracted now and will not have time to do any write ups for those picks.

But, Let me give you the short version here as time is limited:

Nebraska pick - Texas is just not good enough of a team to be spotting 21 points in this game. I realize Nebraska has crossed the threshold of misery and is no longer playing with much emotion and it don’t get much uglier for this team then it has been. Texas seems to have a way though this year to preform poorly enough to give the other team life. The short of it is that 21 is just to many points.

Rice -Its not very often I will back a Rice team. Both these teams can score some points but Marshal has the better defense. Rice has done really good this year though in forcing turnovers. Its only so long a team can be called lucky before you have to start giving them some credit for forcing some of that luck. This is a small play here because I see some value getting more than 8 points in this game.

Florida: This game is on a Neutral field in Jacksonville - its interesting how who is actually listed as the home team is not consistent from site to site right now. This one is pretty much about the numbers. I had Florida as a 7.5 favorite in this game , I felt this line was spot on earlier in the week but now that -6.5 is available at -120 I’m taking it.

UCONN: Earlier in the week I leaned USF but just couldn’t justify the bet. The line move heading into this and now being able to pick up UCONN +4.5 I changed from my initial lean and decided its worth a small play.