College Fans, as we look ahead to the weekend and the bigger bowl games to come, we have some spicy matchups over the next few days. As teams figure out who is playing and who isn’t we find ourselves looking at a couple of games, with key players both in and out.
We have a 5-game slate on Friday, 8 games on Saturday, and a fantastic matchup on Monday, December 30th. I have identified two games that I believe are good matchups.
Bowl season is always tricky to handicap, so make sure you do your due diligence on each team before making your selections! Let's cash both of these!
Ward Is Playing, Can Miami Find a W?
Cam Ward is in, and even though I have not been the highest on Miami this season, I believe they are the better team here. We saw Miami choke away games, and even though they made some nice comebacks, they should have lost more games than they did. This shows what kind of fight this offense has and I believe they will bring it one more time to see Cam off with a win.
Miami clearly has the more explosive offense in this game, especially with Ward playing. They ranked #1 in the country in scoring, 1st in 3rd down conversion rate, 1st in 1st downs/game, and 1st in yards per play at 7.4. I don’t see where Iowa St is going to be able to slow down this offensive attack for 4 quarters and keep up.
Iowa St has shown success in the air and on the ground, but the athletes on this Miami defense I believe will cause some problems. They ranked 53rd in the country in passing yards allowed, and 16th in the country allowing just 110 rushing yards per game. Another stat that stood out was Miamis defense ranked 43rd in RedZone efficiency, and I believe that will be the difference.
I expect points in this game and I believe we will see an over. I also believe Miami will find touchdowns, where Iowa St will have to settle for a few field goals, pushing this past the spread. I expect a lot of points, but a majority of them are coming from the Canes!
Can Iowa Cover?
Look, Iowa not having Kaleb Johnson made me hesitate, and for good reason. He was their best offensive player all season, and someone we cashed a lot of touchdown tickets with. That being said Missouri is missing more players in this game and will be without their top wideout and star Luther Burden.
Iowa ranked 9th in the country in scoring average, allowing just 17 points per game, while scoring 28 per game. This could pose a problem for a Missouri team that allowed 26 points per game and almost 7 yards per play on the road this season.
With Iowa allowing 17 points per game, and 4.7 yards per play, I have a hard time finding where Missouri will have enough success on offense to win by margin. 2 of Iowa’s 4 losses this year were less than 3 points and they covered +3 in their last 5 games of the season. I trust Iowa and Kirk Ferentz to keep this game close!
My Best Bets (2):
Saturday: Miami (FL) -3.5 (-125)
Monday: Iowa +3 (-115)
