College Football Picks: Picking Winners Week 7

CHRIS' PICKS

Virginia Tech –5.5 at North Carolina

This line was initially posted at 8.5, and immediately was bet down. Despite last week's result, my projections had this game as a 13- to 17-point spread for VT. They still control their own destiny in the ACC, are the better coached team and will rebound with a sound win just as they did two weeks ago at Duke.

Temple –7 at Navy

Another line mover, as this initially came in at –4.5 in favor of the Owls. Temple was gashed on the ground by a much bigger Boston College, but three times have held opponents without a rushing score and held a run first and second Tulsa team to 3.2 yards per carry across 66 attempts. Temple put up 49 last week, and Navy ranks 101st in scoring defense.

Duke +3 at Georgia Tech

Duke had a bye week to prepare for the Jackets triple-option, something that has long proven successful against GT. They rank 28th against the run, allowing 3.3 ypc and 122.8 ypg, and held a similar offense in Army to 168 yards on 47 attempts. Only Alcorn State and Bowling Green have failed to top 30 points against Georgia Tech thus far, and Duke won't be the third team to do so. The Blue Devils win outright.

Alabama –28 vs. Missouri

The total is 74, so we're looking at a projected 51-23 final. Missouri is 117th against the pass, and shouldn't slow Bama in any capacity as arguably the worst defense in the SEC. The Tide have been held to less than 51 points just once while allowing more than 23 points just once as well. It's another week where they should be able to name the score.

Middle Tennessee State +2 at Florida International

MTSU has fallen twice; to Vanderbilt and Georgia. The Blue Raiders are coming off an impressive win at Marshall and already own a win over Florida Atlantic. FIU is a rebuilding squad that has only beaten Arkansas Pine Bluff, UMass and Old Dominion, the latter two of which are among the worst in FBS. MTSU has scored at least 37 points in the last three matchups against the Panthers, and quarterback Brent Stockstill had 332 yards and four scores in their most recent contest.

Last week: 3-2; Season: 17-12-1

Greg's Picks

In this game, you remember bad breaks forever and it's tough to realize that the breaks generally do even out over time, but every once in a while, you need a reminder that you can catch a break from time to time. I've dealt with some bad beats this season, and I'm sure I'll deal with more, but the next one I suffer, I'll look back at how I won the Texas A&M game last week and realize that it's not all bad. In case you missed it, A&M was laying 5.5 points and won the toss in OT, which is great in the NFL when laying 5.5 points, but not so much in college as college teams usually defer to see what they need to score. After Kentucky missed its FG, A&M needed only a FG to win the game. Fortunately, the Aggies have had some issues with their kicker this season, so instead of playing for a mid-range FG, they tried to get closer to make it a chip shot. Make no mistake, though, they weren't trying for a TD, at least it didn't appear that way. About five plays in, the Aggie RB broke loose and scored the game-winning TD, leaving the margin at six. Doesn't get much luckier than that. That win put me above .500 for the fifth time in six weeks this season. 



Under 52 Texas A&M at South Carolina



As you can probably guess, I watched the Texas A&M game quite closely last week. In fact, I've watched the Aggies quite a bit this season and two things are true about this team. Its defense is legit and its offense is miserable. The Aggies have yet to score more than 26 points against legitimate competition and when not facing Clemson or Alabama, the Aggies have yielded just 12 points per game. South Carolina got caught up in a bit of a shootout last week, but that was against Missouri, which is more than willing to drag you into a shootout. Against Vandy and Kentucky, teams similar to Texas A&M, the total points scored was 42.5 per game.


Virginia Tech -5.5 at North Carolina



This is the third consecutive week the Hokies have appeared in this column, but this time, I'm actually siding with them. The reason being, the Hokies didn't look half bad last week even though they didn't cover. Not exactly a ringing endorsement, I know, but when you lose your starting QB while losing to Old Dominion, the bar moves. The Hokies new QB Ryan Willis and the offense as a whole, actually looked good at times against Notre Dame and the defense, well, the defense was up against it facing Notre Dame, but it didn't look terrible. Against weaker competition, like, say, North Carolina, the Hokies could potentially look good on both sides of the ball. When we last saw the Tar Heels, they were getting embarrassed at Miami and although they aren't as bad as they looked that night, they certainly don't have a lot going for them now. 



Over 70.5 Mississippi at Arkansas

Arkansas has struggled on offense for much of the season, but the Hogs found some traction last week against of all teams, the Crimson Tide. There's no reason that the Hogs can't keep that momentum going this week against a Mississippi team that has allowed more than 40 points three times this season. As for the Arkansas defense, as you might expect, it leaves a lot to be desired, surrendering 34-plus points in four of its past five games. Ole Miss really found its groove on offense last week, posting a 70-spot against ULM. It was the second time that Ole Miss had posted 70 points in a game this season, which gives you an idea of how potent the Rebels can be when not facing Alabama or LSU.

Ohio State -29.5 vs. Minnesota



This is just a bad spot for the Gophers. If Ohio State has a weakness, it that the Buckeyes have proved to be susceptible to the big play. The problem is, the Gophers, while improved on offense from last season, don't really have big-play capability. Making matters worse, the Buckeyes came out flat last week against Indiana, and the likelihood of that happening two consecutive weeks is low. In other words, I don't expect the Buckeyes to sleep walk through the first quarter this week, like they did last week and that means they are likely to get off to a fast start. The Gopher's have lost too many key contributors already to keep up with a team like the Buckeyes.

Alabama -28 vs. Missouri

Looking at Missouri's resume, this line looks out of whack, after all, the Tigers made a game out of it against Georgia and the Bulldogs are as close to the Tide as any team in the country. But the timing for the Tigers is poor this week as even though Alabama crushed Arkansas last week, coach Nick Saban was able to come away with a point of emphasis for his team. That point is the second-half defense, as for the second consecutive week, it was terrible. It's the reason the Tide have failed to cover their last two games, but you can bet it will be better this week. The offense is not in question, it will score nearly every time it has the ball in the first three quarters, it's just a matter of how many stops the defense can get.


Last Week: 3-2; Season: 18-12