The App is Back! Don’t forget to download the NBC Sports EDGE app to receive real-time player news, mobile alerts and track your favorite players. Plus, now you can check out articles and player cards. Get it here!
While Week 12 was relatively normal, with higher ranked teams taking home the W most of the time, there was still quite a bit of excitement. Despite how chalk a majority of the ranked games were, No. 3 falling yet again is a big deal, and quite a few other top schools were given a run for their money.
On the flip side, some of the favorites winning were surprising because of how dominantly they won. That didn’t match with the betting action.
The past 11 weeks being so chaotic has possibly taken a toll on the bettors, who seemed much less confident this week than in the past, and ironically were burned for their caution. Just one ranked game had both total bets and total handle go over 80% for one team, the lowest amount all year. Funnily enough it didn’t even hit.
Upset Alert
The only two ranked upsets this week weren’t actually upsets in the eyes of the oddsmakers. Still, they were notable games, even if the “upset” wasn’t unexpected.
#10 Wake Forest at Clemson (Line: Clemson -3.5, O/U 57)
Result: Clemson wins 48-27
Death Valley is still quite the intimidating place to play as it turns out, as the Tigers crushed the Demon Deacons with little issue. They jumped out to a 10-0 lead and never looked back, and a massive third quarter put the game, and the line, to bed. Wake Forests’ defense was it’s normal leaky self, but the offense, their calling card, went absent at the worst possible time with Sam Hartman having his worst game of the season. The Clemson defense is still legit, and they got to Hartman seven times over the course of the game. On the other hand, Clemson was able to pound Wake Forest into the dirt, running for 333 yards to go along with four touchdowns.
Wake Forest was one of the most popular picks of the day, with 74% of the total bets and 73% of the total money going to the Deacons, who fell well short of covering. Luckily, with how Wake Forest has been playing the over was an easy pick, especially with a relatively low 57 as the number. Wake Forest and Clemson combined to smash the over, which 81% of the tickets and 86% of the handle predicted them to do.
#3 Oregon at #23 Utah (Line: Utah -3, O/U 58.5)
Result: Utah wins 38-7
The big upset of the day wasn’t much of an upset at all according to Vegas, who favored the Utes from the get-go. That proved astute (if anything the line wasn’t big enough in favor of Utah) as Utah absolutely stomped Oregon, with the game not being remotely close. Utah controlled the game with running and defense, and throttled the Ducks. They used a huge second quarter to open up a 28-0 halftime lead and the game was over.
Just like with Wake Forest, bettors jumped at the opportunity to take the higher ranked team with points, and it proved their undoing. Vegas sets the lines as they do for a reason. Luckily it wasn’t as bad as Wake Forest-Clemson, as just 69% of the public and 61% of the money went for the Ducks. Interestingly, a slight majority of total bets (54%) and total handle (60%) went with the under despite Oregon and Utah scoring over 30 points a game and the O/U set at 58.5. It proved the right choice though, as Oregon’s offense abandoned them with the season on the line.
This was the second time that Oregon had moved themselves into a top four spot and lost, and the Pac-12 will wait another year to get a team back into the playoffs.
Editor’s Note: Play for FREE! Download the NBC Sports Predictor app, make picks and win huge, weekly jackpots. Get started here!
Protectors of Your Cash
No team technically qualified for this category as just one team got over 80% of the tickets and money, but we’ll relax the requirements a bit.
Georgia Tech at #8 Notre Dame (Line: Notre Dame - 17.5, O/U 58)
Result: Notre Dame wins 55-0
This was a brutal game to watch, as Notre Dame beat down the poor Yellow Jackets. QB Jordan Yates was making just his second start, and his inexperience showed as he surrendered two turnovers that were returned for touchdowns. It doesn’t get any easier for him either, as he takes on Georgia next week. Talk about getting thrown into the fire. Notre Dame came out swinging, and eventually built up a massive 45-0 lead going into the half and pulled pretty much all of their starters. This led to a calm second half, with just 10 points scored in the final two frames.
The line moved two points in Notre Dame’s favor between opening and kickoff, but clearly it wasn’t anywhere near enough. Considering the line movement, it’s probably not surprising that 79% of the total bet percentage went to the Irish, and 70% of the money did as well. Those bets hit after the first quarter. Much more interesting was the O/U, which again a big majority (74% of bets, 79% of the handle) going under. With Notre Dame piling on 45 in the first half, 58 looked very vulnerable if Georgia Tech could pull back some garbage time points, but it wasn’t to be. The closest Georgia Tech got was the Notre Dame 15 after a big run by Yates, who then fumbled the ball away for an ND touchdown a few plays later.
Failure to Launch
Just one team had a significant portion of the action go their way, but another team just missed the threshold, close enough to get a mention.
#14 BYU at Georgia Southern (Line: BYU -20, O/U 57.5)
Result: BYU wins 34-17
The only massively lopsided action went to BYU, who didn’t look close to covering for most of the game. Even though the final score was 17, BYU led by just three at halftime, and I’d wager most people gave up on the 20 point spread by then. BYU turned in a better second half, shutting the Eagles out but they also played more conservatively, dialing up mostly rushes to run the clock. They did a masterful job of it to ice the game, burning the last eight minutes of the fourth quarter. The Cougars did get as close as the Georgia Southern six-yard line, but they had no reason to try to score more and didn’t.
Unfortunately, that means they did not cover, which a massive 88% of bets and 93% of the handle expected them to do. It makes sense, as Georgia Southern had lost four of their last five, and routinely let much lesser offenses than BYU drop 30+ on them while they struggled to score. In their losses, the Eagles were averaging just 13 points a game. BYU on the other hand had dropped 66 and 49 in their past two. Good bet or not, it didn’t work out in a major way. The O/U did much better though, with 66% of the tickets and 82% of the money taking under which hit. It’s lucky BYU slowed the game way down, as 37 points were scored in the first half, putting them well on pace to break 57.5.
#21 Arkansas at #2 Alabama (Line: Alabama -20.5, O/U 58.5)
Result: Alabama wins 42-35
Arkansas ran with Alabama every step of the way in this one, leading to an exciting back and forth contest. Alabama’s Bryce Young got to stay in for the whole game and set a single game Alabama passing record, an impressive feat at such a storied program. Alabama’s offensive prowess was not up for debate, but Arkansas’ was, as they’ve been up and down all year. They dropped 45 on Georgia Southern, then just 20 against Texas A&M and got shut out by Georgia. Then the next week put up 51 on Ole Miss, before scoring just 23 against Auburn. Leading into the Alabama game they scored just 16 on LSU, leading to the large line and the expected blow out. It seems good Arkansas came to play though, and Treylon Burks in particular was fantastic. Alabama needed every bit of Young’s record breaking 559 yards and Jameson William’s three touchdowns to stay just ahead. Bama took a 10 point lead into half with still a decent chance to cover, and scored first moving the lead to 17, however Arkansas refused to back down and cut the game to just six in the fourth and by then the cover was over for the Crimson Tide.
Narrowly missing out on the 80% threshold, 73% of the total tickets took Alabama to win easily, while 81% of the handle did the same. To be fair, it would have been hard to predict that Alabama would give up their 35 to Arkansas, as only one team managed more than that was Texas A&M in Bama’s only loss. In fact, the Razorbacks were just the second team to break 30 on them. Bama’s offense did their job (the implicit score was 39.5-19) but the Crimson Tide defense dropped the ball for a large majority of bettors. Interestingly, while 53% of the total bets went for the over, a pretty large 71% took under. If bad Arkansas showed up that was a possibility, but either way Alabama is always good for about 40 points (their season average is 44.4) which means Arkansas would’ve needed to be held under 20 to go under. That’s only happened twice, in the shutout against Georgia and the previous week against LSU.
Split Decisions
Less bettors going all in on one team means much more games getting split between handle and bets. Seven of the 20 games involving ranked teams had the majority of the bets and the majority of the handle disagree of who to take, easily one of the most this season.
SMU at #5 Cincinnati (Line: Cincinnati -10, O/U 65.5)
Result: Cincinnati wins 48-14
Well, I guess Cincinnati is only interested in running up the score on good teams, which to be fair is impressive in its own way. After failing to cover against five cupcakes pretty much, they blew the doors off the second best team they’ve played all year. Cincy’s defense came to play, completely shutting down Tanner Mordecai, who had thrown 37 touchdowns and passed for 3264 yards going into Nippert Stadium. He left with just one more touchdown (in garbage time), and even crazier, just 66 more passing yards. Cincinnati needed a statement win, and they certainly got one, dominating every single phase of the game.
Because of Cincy’s aforementioned failures in the past five games where they were heavily bet to cover, the pendulum finally swung the other way (70% of the money went to SMU), and of course this was the game that they covered. In fact, SMU was so heavily bet that the line moved from Cincinnati -12 at opening to -10 at kick. At least 55% of the total bets still trusted the Bearcats, but that was a massive loss for the handle. The O/U was also split, although this one was much smaller. Just 59% of total bets took over and 56% of the handle took under, which made it by 3.5 points. Of course, SMU’s 14 points in the 4th were total garbage time, so despite the somewhat close number, in reality it wasn’t very dramatic.
I have no idea what to make of this Bearcats team, and it shouldn’t surprise anyone to see them open as 14+ point favorites against East Carolina and then fail spectacularly to cover. This is especially true with Oregon’s fall. Cincinnati should move into the fourth playoff spot, and as long as they don’t lose they are in. Getting a lead and sitting on it has been the Cincy special as of late (except this game of course) and that’s what I’d expect against East Carolina. Then again, the Pirates are 7-4, and the Bearcats have covered against every team with a positive record they’ve played against except Murray State all the way back in Week 2. Perhaps Cincinnati is just the perfected version of Purdue, where they only try against good teams but still don’t get upset by the bad ones.
UAB at #22 UTSA (Line: UTSA -4, O/U 53.5)
Result: UTSA wins 34-31
The biggest split decision of the week in terms of point spread, as 67% of the total tickets took UTSA, while 61% of the money went with UAB. As fitting for such a split decision, the game was tightly contested throughout. The lead for either team was never more than seven. UAB took the first lead and held it through halftime. A big UTSA third quarter had UTSA take their first lead before UAB took it back with 5:25 left in the 4th. UTSA’s subsequent drive stalled out with 2:07 left after a turnover on downs, and it seemed like one of the final three undefeated teams would fall. Then a miracle happened. The Roadrunner defense held, and they got the ball back on their own 23 with just 1:12 left in the game. They eventually marched their way to the UAB 1-yard line, and with just nine seconds left in the game Frank Harris essentially walked it off with a pass to Oscar Cardenas, who earned all 29 of his yards on that final drive.
It was as close as it gets, but ultimately despite the win UTSA did fail to cover. Point to the handle majority on this one. The action on the O/U was not split, with 57% of the bets taking over along with a much bigger 71% of the money doing the same. It did take until late in the 4th to go over, but with how tightly contested the game was with both teams scoring back and forth, it was more of a “when” rather than “if”.
Patrick Beverly “He Trick Y’all” Award
#7 Michigan State at #4 Ohio State (Line: Ohio State -20, O/U 70)
Result: Ohio State wins 56-7
This one got ugly really quickly, and the same old story with non-OSU Big Ten teams played out yet again. With their almost complete inability to meaningfully pass the ball, if these Big Ten teams fall in a hole things tend to spiral fast. At least most of the elite Big Ten teams have great defenses, but Michigan State didn’t even have that, with their pass defense being one of the worst in the FBS. Combine that against OSU’s absurd wealth of offensive talent and this one was not close.
Somehow a 56-7 score flatters Michigan State, as OSU scored touchdowns on their first seven offensive possessions. Receivers were running around as if the defense didn’t exist, and CJ Stroud had absolutely no trouble picking apart the Spartans to the tune of 432 yards and six touchdowns in ONE HALF. Obviously the starters were all pulled after that, and OSU and Michigan State scored just the one touchdown each in the 4th in garbage time. Michigan State’s touchdown wasn’t even a full drive, as they needed an interception on the Buckeyes’ backup QB to get them halfway. Michigan State’s star running back Kenneth Walker took just six carries with the game out of hand so quickly, and Payton Thorne was not nearly up to the task of carrying the offensive load.
Michigan State was the majority pick by the bettors, with 74% of the bets and 66% of the money taking them to at least put up a nominal fight like Purdue did last week. They couldn’t even muster that, and this one was completely over after the first quarter. In fact, they were bet enough that the line actually moved from OSU -20 to -19.5. Not a big move, but it shows that Michigan State was the public’s pick which turned out to be foolish. Speaking of line movements, the points total also took a shift, going from 67 at opening to 70 by kickoff. It didn’t end up mattering as neither total hit because of Michigan State’s ineptitude and OSU taking their foot way off the gas for the whole second half. I’m not sure why the line moved as much as it did, with just over 57% of the total tickets and 53% of the handle taking over, but perhaps it was much bigger before the line moved and the action course corrected. Either way, OSU is rolling right now, and there aren’t a lot of numbers that I wouldn’t take them at against Michigan. Given how much Ryan Day cares about embarrassing Michigan and how good OSU’s offense is, high scores are the expectation.
Close Call
Tennessee State at #25 Mississippi State (Line: Mississippi State -44, O/U 56)
Result: Mississippi State win 55-10
There are some situations where it’s such a close call that you really have to wonder if someone on Mississippi State’s staff knew the line and had money on the game. Many SEC teams took their classic late season “bye” which led to some massive point spreads, and Mississippi State was one of them. Favored by a gigantic 44 points, they would’ve needed to score and score and score to make it, especially when Tennessee State pulled back 10 points in the fourth quarter. When that happened, I’m sure most watchers thought the cover was over, and they should have been right. Yet, for some odd reason Mississippi State continued to throw the ball up 42 points with just 3:03 left in the 4th quarter. They had just one rush on the drive, and with 1:11 remaining Mississippi State decided to kick the field goal to barely sneak the cover by one point. There are some possible explanations to their actions. The throwing one could plausibly argue that they wanted to give senior QB Chance Lovertich a chance to play in probably his final game time, while the field goal is a somewhat natural move when they couldn’t technically kneel the clock out and they were already in field goal distance (although some teams will opt to kneel it anyways with the game so completely over) but both things coming together really made this one a strange cover.
A small majority of both bets and handle (58% and 55% respectively) took Tennessee State, thinking the line was just too big. In addition, assuming it would be a route and Mississippi State would stop trying quickly 58% of the tickets and 60% of the money went under which cleanly missed with the Bulldogs nearly hitting it by themselves.
Final Notes
Two more point totals deserve to be looked at briefly. Vanderbilt and Ole Miss had arguably the biggest split to date, with 70% of the bets taking under, and 72% of the handle taking over, which is the first time this season the opposite sides have been 70% or higher each. Secondly, the NC State-Syracuse point total action was weirdly lopsided. Syracuse’s offense may be terrible, but NC State’s isn’t and they had just dropped 42 on Wake Forest. With the number set at just 49.5 (tied for lowest total amongst non Big Ten teams) it’s odd that a whopping 81% of the bets and 85% of the money hammered under. Syracuse would have just needed a few garbage time points, which they got. After the 0-0 first quarter the public was probably pretty happy, but a massive second quarter put that to bed. It’s especially strange when 68% of the handle took Syracuse to cover 11.5, which meant they would’ve had to score SOME points. Finally, Georgia narrowly missed covering against Charleston Southern on a bizarre play. CSU’s QB was picked off by Xavien Sorey Jr, who had the ball just clean ripped from his grasp by wide receiver Garris Schwarting who went on to score a 64-yard “fumble return” touchdown.
There’s only one more week of regular season college football, as the season has just flown by. The chaos isn’t over yet, as the final games for many of these teams could prove their toughest, and then conference championships are on the way which should provide even more drama and chaos. Things have smoothed out a bit after the absolute mess that was the beginning and middle of the season, and we still have playoff teams dropping out every week. We can only pray the finish to this wild season lives up to the fantastic start.
PointsBet is our Official Sports Betting Partner, and we may receive compensation if you place a bet on PointsBet for the first time after clicking our links.
