Colorado vs. Georgia Tech
Our first weeknight college football action comes on Thursday night with four games, three of them with massive spreads. The one game that doesn’t have a spread in the 20s is easily the most interesting game on the slate, as Colorado heads to Georgia Tech in a Big 12 vs. ACC showdown. Not surprisingly, Colorado vs. Georgia Tech gets the ESPN billing, as UMass vs. Rutgers and UAB vs. Illinois are on the Big Ten Network and Akron vs. Wake Forest is on the ACC Network.
Once we get deeper into the season, we’ll get the Sun Belt, Conference USA, and MACtion, but for now, we’ll take whatever we can get with games on Thursday and Friday to kick off Week 1.
Odds from Circa Sports as of September 1, 12:30 p.m. PT; check out our Circa Betting Splits and DraftKings Betting Splits. See all of our Week 1 College Football Picks and Predictions.
Colorado vs. Georgia Tech (-6.5, 50.5) Prediction
8 p.m. ET
Pick: Colorado +6.5
We could see a major contrast in styles in this game with new offensive coordinators on both sides. Colorado has installed the “Go-Go” offense of Brennan Marion, who was the head coach at Sacramento State the last two seasons and had stops at UNLV, William & Mary, and Howard as an OC. Whether or not QB Julian Lewis is the right fit for this scheme remains to be seen, but the Buffaloes could have some big advantages at home in Boulder playing with pace while rotating out a bunch of backs to keep everybody fresh.
Will they look to push the tempo on a sultry night in Atlanta? The kickoff temperature should be around 90 with a dewpoint pushing 70 and the humidity rising throughout the night, so you do wonder how the Buffs will be able to adjust to and handle those conditions. It gets hot in Boulder, but not like this. Nobody for Colorado had more than 384 yards rushing last season, so Marion will probably be looking at a lot of guys to see who can be featured.
The Yellow Jackets offense may not have a lot of buzz in this one under new OC George Godsey. He’s at his alma mater now after spending the last four seasons as the tight ends coach with the Ravens. I’m thinking that means we’ll see a lot of 12 personnel and maybe even some 22 personnel with some big-boy football. With Alabama and Michigan transfer Justice Haynes, who ran for over seven yards per carry last season, and Malachi Hosley, who had 7.1 YPC for this team, there are two super-reliable RBs to build around. Per 247Sports, Haynes was the best RB in the transfer portal.
The other position that GT really focused on in the portal was TE, hardly a surprise with Godsey calling plays. Two of the 3+ star players per 247 the Yellow Jackets snagged from the portal were tight ends, so it’s going to be a very heavy offense for new QB Alberto Mendoza, the transfer from Indiana, who now has a chance to make a name for himself instead of sitting behind his brother on the depth chart.
Defensively, you have to wonder how Marion’s tempo will impact the Buffs on a side of the ball where they need to greatly improve. They were 118th in yards per play allowed last season with over 6.1 and 112th in scoring defense with more than 30 PPG against. Chris Marve is the new DC after serving as the team’s linebackers coach last season. With his background at Virginia Tech, there is a lot of hope for this defense to improve. The linebackers sure seem important here given how I expect GT to use RBs and TEs.
The Bees have a new DC as well, as they hired Jason Semore from Southern Miss after he served in the same role for head coach Charles Huff there and at Marshall. The Golden Eagles had 29 takeaways and led the nation with 23 interceptions, so you would imagine that the Yellow Jackets will look to force more turnovers since they only had nine last season. Despite the lack of takeaways, the Yellow Jackets were still 69th in scoring defense. Takeaways with a ball-control offense may help them overachieve as the season goes along.
Colorado vs. Georgia Tech Prediction
Both of these teams have a ton of new players and new coaches, so this is a very high-variance game. I could see a blowout either way, a high-scoring game or a low-scoring game, or a game that hangs around the number and is maybe decided late. Really, the wild card to me is Lewis in Marion’s offense. I love what the Yellow Jackets did at the running back position and Colorado was one of the worst run defenses in the nation. As such, they should sell out against the run here and make Mendoza beat them. If he does that and they win by margin, I won’t be surprised, but the Buffaloes have had a much more engaged Deion Sanders in the offseason. I’ll take the points to start and look to see what happens with live betting opportunities.
Pick: Colorado +6.5
Other Thursday Games
UMass vs. Rutgers (-28.5, 51.5): A rough game here, as UMass starts over following an injury-riddled season. QB Pop Watson has been around and this is a homecoming for him, so the Minutemen might have more of a spark on offense. There are a lot of losses and turnover for Rutgers, including Athan Kaliakmanis, so they may not be fully equipped to win by more than four touchdowns.
Akron vs. Wake Forest (-24.5, 48.5): There are eligibility concerns about Reese Poffenbarger here, the Miami and Albany transfer who was expected to start for the Zips. He’s still waiting approval on a medical waiver for an extra year. Lightly-used QB Brayden Raggow would get the start if so. That’s kind of a tricky situation for Wake Forest’s preparation, but they’re way more talented than the Zips. Wake has Gio Lopez at QB, but lost a lot from Scottie Hazelton’s solid defense. Maybe an Over play?
UAB vs. Illinois (-27.5, 54.5): I’d say the big story here is that UAB hired longtime coordinator Todd Grantham to fix the defense in some way. Alex Mortensen is still the head coach after being promoted from OC, so we’ll see if his install carries over better this season. On the Illinois side, there are a lot of changes, including the implementation of a 3-3-5 stack defense under Bobby Hauck. With some shuffling on the offensive line, winning by 4+ touchdowns seems like a big ask, but UAB might be downright awful again.
Check out picks from VSiN hosts and guests on this game and all of the Week 1 games on our Pro Picks Page.
