Early Betting Notes For College Football Week 13

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[h=1]Opening Kick: Early betting notes for college football Week 13[/h]Will Harris, ESPN Contributor
ESPN INSIDER

It's the final week of the regular season for the eight leagues with championship games, while eight teams have clinched division crowns and berths into their league title games. Air Force will play San Diego State for the MWC title and Clemson and North Carolina will decide the ACC. Meanwhile, Bowling Green, Iowa, Florida and Stanford have locked up their divisions and are awaiting their opponents.
This week's juicy slate features winner-take-all clashes for the AAC West and Pac-12 South, as well as bona fide semifinals in Conference USA, where Louisiana Tech hosts Southern Miss and Western Kentucky hosts Marshall, with each game determining a division title and the winners advancing to play each other for the championship.
Note: Lines and futures are from the Westgate Las Vegas SuperBook as of Monday afternoon except where otherwise specified. Preseason lines quoted are from 5Dimes unless specified. The Wynn is the first Las Vegas book to post college football lines each week, so their numbers are used for the Sunday openers when referencing the week's biggest moves.

[h=2]Adjustments and takeaways, Week 12[/h]Farewell, Paul Rhoads
From coordinating Pitt's colossal 13-9 upset of West Virginia that cost Rich Rodriguez a shot at the 2007 national title, to the 2009 "I'm so proud to be your coach!" locker room moment following his defense's eight-takeaway performance in a 9-7 upset at Nebraska, to the 2011 win over unbeaten Oklahoma State that gave Alabama another shot at LSU, Paul Rhoads has left us plenty to remember about him.
We were surprised that Rhoads was fired, given his close relationship with Iowa State athletic director Jamie Pollard and the sharp uptick in the team's performance since midseason changes at offensive coordinator and quarterback. But 32 wins in seven years and a disastrous collapse at Kansas State -- one that saw Rhoads join luminaries like Barry Alvarez and Mike Leach in the infamous club of coaches who lost games in which victory required only execution of the kneel-down play -- was enough for Pollard to pull the plug.
The way this team snatched defeat from the jaws of victory at Kansas State was absolutely brutal, especially on the heels of the collapse that spoiled the Cyclones' upset bid versus Oklahoma State the week before. We were expecting this team to limp into the finale in Morgantown with something still in the tank. That had us really looking forward to laying two touchdowns with a West Virginia team that we rarely back but that is playing well and has its running game really cranked up. Run defense is usually where being in the tank shows first, and it was just hard to imagine Iowa State getting off the mat to prepare with purpose for this uninspiring season-ending road trip. We figured we'd be writing something later in the week like, "We admire Paul Rhoads' ability to forge teams with strong intangibles, but it's the intangibles that will get his down-and-out Cyclones rolled in Morgantown this week."
But things have changed. Rhoads' players will certainly rally around the popular coach, who will be on the sideline for the finale, and now laying double digits with West Virginia is out of the question. We might just change sides before the week is out.
Where does the program go from here? Iowa State is a consistently struggling program that has only been ranked twice and hasn't won a conference championship since 1912. Only one coach since World War I, Earle Bruce, has left Ames with a winning record. The list of failures includes the school's top two all-time win leaders, and two more coaches who won national championships elsewhere. The school, which fired its all-time winningest coach, Dan McCarney, just three years before hiring Rhoads, obviously wants to raise the program's expectations. Recent significant facility improvements are another clear sign of increased commitment.
But this program has to change its course. It is firing another good coach, one who knew how to instill a tough, hardworking culture and get the most out of inferior talent but still couldn't win enough games. So just bringing in a quality coach is not enough. Iowa State has to change the whole dynamic, and that means one of two things: different players, or a different blueprint. The Cyclones must either hire an ace salesman who can recruit the top-shelf players required to compete in a tough Big 12 that's full of better, faster athletes than Iowa State has ever had, or go off the conference reservation entirely and stop trying to beat the league at its own game.
The best stop along the latter route is Ken Niumatalolo, though we're not convinced he can be had. The Navy boss is a Paul Johnson disciple and the next-leading practitioner of an option offense that has touched five FBS programs. But whether it's a unique scheme, selling out to recruiting with a marketing makeover or some other original angle, Iowa State will have to differentiate itself from its Big 12 brethren in some way. The program has proven time and again that good coaching alone doesn't get it done in Ames.


Next QB In
Defense might win championships, but sometimes quarterback depth does too, and it's always something to think long and hard about when playing the championship futures market. Baylor and Michigan State followed the lead of 2014 Ohio State and showed off some impressive backup quarterbacks Saturday, winning elimination games to stay in their conference races.
Baylor's Chris Johnson was the third man up, but he took over for the injuredJarrett Stidham and put Oklahoma State away with two long third-quarter touchdown passes.
With Connor Cook shelved, Sparty kept the ball on the ground with an improvised two-quarterback offense that was heavy on quarterback runs, leading to matching eight-carry, 25-yard rushing totals from both Tyler O'Connor and Damion Terry. It wasn't much, but it was enough.
The 5-7 teams shouldn't get their bowl hopes up too much.
With a record 80 teams needed to fill postseason games, it looked like this year was the best chance by far for the number of bowl spots to exceed the number of bowl-eligible teams. But with 71 teams now eligible, only nine spots need be filled and there are twice as many teams still on the six-win bubble. Of those 18, five teams are Big 12 or Sun Belt members with two games left to play. Three of those five are real long shots to make it to six wins. But 11 of the remaining 13 that close their season this week are either favored or underdogs of four points or fewer. It will be a very close call as to whether a 5-7 team is needed this year.

[h=2]Games of interest, Week 12[/h]LSU (-5.5) versus Texas A&M
It's hard to believe the boss of an athletic department as accomplished as LSU's might make the colossal mistake of intentionally attempting to trade in a Hall of Fame coach for the significant downgrade of Jimbo Fisher. Whatever happens, we expect LSU's players to respond to the noise, reclaim their identity as the most physical team on the field and whip Texas A&M in front of 100,000 fans -- Les Miles supporters, detractors and undecideds alike -- uniting for a night to make things difficult for the Aggies.
Virginia Tech (-3) at Virginia
There's no question Virginia will come to play in what the Cavs know is their last chance to beat the man who has tormented them for the better part of two decades. But Frank Beamer knows how to beat the Hoos, and his team will be locked and loaded in what is truly a must-win spot. We anticipate backing the Hokies for a third straight week.
No. 1 Clemson (-18) versus South Carolina
Road favorites in rivalry games aren't typically the first place we look for good values, but if Clemson shows up with something to prove, the Tigers can name their score. We'll be watching this team closely this week, because it's easy to see the favorite thinking that it won't have to prepare or play too hard to beat a team that just lost to The Citadel. But while the Tigers snapped a five-game series losing streak last year, they haven't won in Columbia since 2007. This could be an overconfident team expecting a cakewalk, but it could well be a team that feels like it still owes Carolina a whooping, and shows up bent on embarrassing the rival Gamecocks while they're down. The disparity between the two teams' best efforts is greater than the asking price, but this game -- like so many others featuring big road favorites -- will be determined by the mentality of the visitor.
[h=2]Movers and shakers[/h]According the the Westgate Las Vegas SuperBook, the national title race is down to 13 contenders. Here are the last teams remaining on the board, with last week's prices in parentheses.


  • Alabama 3-2 (5-2)
  • Clemson 4-1 (7-2)
  • Oklahoma 7-1 (10-1)
  • Baylor 8-1 (60-1)
  • Notre Dame 8-1 (8-1)
  • Michigan State 12-1 (40-1)
  • Iowa 20-1 (20-1)
  • Ohio State 20-1 (11-4)
  • Oklahoma State 25-1 (12-1)
  • Florida 25-1 (25-1)
  • Michigan 30-1 (100-1)
  • Stanford 50-1 (300-1)
  • North Carolina 60-1 (80-1)
    Naturally, the two big winners (Michigan State and Baylor) saw their prices drop, while Ohio State and Oklahoma State saw theirs lengthen. But Michigan's chances also took a hit, with Sparty now an odds-on favorite to win the division by beating Penn State at home.
    The oddsmakers also realized that Stanford's price was a bit too high at 300-1 last week (and probably got a notice to that effect in the form of some big bets on the Cardinal.)
    There are few big early moves so far this week, but Tulsa has moved from minus-4 to minus-6.6 on the road at Tulane. The Golden Hurricane need a win to get to 6-6 and bowl eligibility.
    Surging Oregon has moved from minus-31 to minus-34 in the Civil War with Oregon State.
    Appalachian State is up to minus-23 from an opener of minus-20 versus reeling Louisiana-Lafayette.

    [h=2]Chalk Bits[/h]Comparing the Westgate's prices at the time of this writing to their last preseason "Games of the Year" numbers at the end of August, we see that there are several games this week that have moved more than 10 points from those preseason numbers:
  • Alabama is minus-14 in the Iron Bowl after laying two in August.
  • Oregon is minus-34.5 against Oregon State, up from minus-21.5.
  • Nebraska is plus-2.5 after laying Iowa plus-9.5 at the beginning of the year.
  • Clemson was giving South Carolina just three in August, but it's now minus-18
    By kickoff, the biggest move of all might be on Jim Harbaugh's first Michigan squad, a 13.5-point preseason underdog to Ohio State. The Wolverines were taking 6.5 points as recently as last week. And now the game is a pick 'em at the Westgate, the lowest available number in a market that has the host as a small favorite at nearly every shop.
    Texas is an elite program, but not every year has been a parade for the Longhorns. There were some rough times in the 1930s, three bad years immediately prior to the legendary Darrell Royal's arrival, three losing seasons in five years under David McWilliams and, of course, the rocky end to Mack Brown's tenure.
    <article class="ad-300" style="box-sizing: border-box; clear: both; overflow: hidden; position: relative; z-index: 1000026; margin: 0px 0px 0px 10px; float: right;">
    </article>The Horns have had some bad teams over the years, but only five of them have ever lost to Texas Tech in Austin. And no Texas team has ever been a home underdog to the Red Raiders. So how bad is this year's squad? Only John Mackovic's historically futile final team in 1997 was less than a touchdown favorite at home to a Texas Tech program that owns just 15 wins in 64 tries against the Longhorns. For this year's Tech team -- one with arguably the worst defense of any power five team -- to be taking a point and a half in Austin on Thanksgiving night is a stark indicator of the current hard times in the Hill Country.
 

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