Tuley’s Takes – Week 5 College Football Best Bets, Picks and Predictions:
While we’re hopefully back on the winning track in the NFL at Tuley’s Takes home office, we’re still trying to get there in college football. We had our second straight 1-3 ATS week in a row last Saturday, with losses on Ole Miss +3.5 at Florida, Texas A&M +8.5 at LSU, and South Carolina +12.5 at Alabama. Fortunately, we won with Stanford +3.5 vs. Georgia Tech in a 34-27 home upset in a late West Coast game, avoiding a complete disaster and ending on a winning note.
We always “go to school” on our results every week to see what we did right and hopefully also try to learn from where we went wrong. I guess the obvious lessons are to try to find more live home underdogs as our lone dog was the only victory, plus maybe avoid the SEC (which the first three losses also had in common), as it just looks like the rich keep getting richer in this era of the transfer portal and NILs.
Let’s see if we can apply any of that to the CFB Week 5 Saturday card with our “dog or pass” plays.
Stanford (+14) at Wake Forest
Staying away from the SEC (at least for this week), we find ourselves back on our lone CFB Week 4 winner, Stanford, which earned its first ACC victory over Georgia Tech and now travels to Wake Forest. We have a good QB matchup here with Wake’s Gio Lopez, but Stanford’s Davis Warren threw for 396 yards in the comeback win over Tech and faces a Demon Deacon defense that allows opposing QBs to complete 80% of their passes. Coupled with the Cardinal ground game, that should help us stay within two TDs.
College Football Best Bet: Stanford +14
Michigan at Minnesota (+6)
We had to find a home dog, and this one jumped off the betting board. The Golden Gophers let me down three weeks ago as home dogs vs. Mississippi State, but they bounced back to beat the MAC’s Akron as expected, then pulled off an unexpected upset at Washington as 12.5-point underdogs to get back to 3-1. That’s also Michigan’s record, though they’ve arrived at it a little more unconventionally, as we all know, with the controversial Second Hail Mary to beat the MAC’s Western Michigan and then losing on the final play of the game to Iowa last week. They could (and some say should) be 2-2. Minnesota’s defense is just as good as Michigan’s (which has also been terrible defending the Red Zone and committing too many penalties), and neither offense is particularly explosive, so this should be a close, relatively low-scoring game (Over/Unders is just 43.5 points). This line opened at Michigan -8.5, which I wish I had grabbed, but I still believe we’re on the right side at anything more than a FG.
College Football Best Bet: Minnesota +6
Washington (+9.5) at #18 USC
Sticking in the Big Ten (which still pains me to write with these two recent additions, longtime members of the Pac-12 and Rose Bowl rivals with the Big Ten), Washington visits Southern Cal. The Huskies started the season ranked No. 17 but dropped out of the Top 25 after a 24-10 win over Washington State and 16-14 over the Mountain West’s Utah State. They routed Eastern Washington 48-16 but then lost the aforementioned 27-24 game to Minnesota as 12.5-point chalk. But I like the Huskies to bounce back here in the underdog role against USC, which is coming off its first win of the season, 41-27, to Oregon. I think that took some of the swagger out of the previously undefeated Trojans. I’m also fading the USC defense here, which allowed 289 passing yards and four touchdowns in the loss to Oregon, and that was AFTER knocking out star starting QB Dante Moore. Washington stays in this the whole way, and I’ll even take a little on +300 on the money line.
College Football Best Bet: Washington +9.5
Texas State at San Diego State (+8)
Looking for one more home underdog, I found the Aztecs, as this line was Texas State -4.5 in this Pac-12 matchup (yes, this is your new Pac-12), but was up to -8 on Thursday. The opening line made sense, as Texas State (2-2) has turned its season around after an 0-2 start (understandable losses to Texas and UTSA) with expected wins over North Texas and Incarnate Word, while San Diego State (1-3) has lost three straight to UCLA, James Madison and Toledo, plus also lost its two top running backs. But the line move is due to a mumps outbreak in the Aztecs locker room. SDSU is mostly keeping mum (sorry) on details, citing HIPAA and privacy concerns, as we usually see with the lack of college injury reports. I’ve seen similar cases over the years where the market overreacts to news like this and the healthy starters and reserves usually step up to play for their fallen teammates. Of course, if we hear the Aztecs can’t field a competitive team, we won’t go ahead with the bet on Saturday night, but it’s more likely we’re getting a few bonus points here.
College Football Best Bet: San Diego State +8
For more Week 5 college football picks and predictions, visit the Week 5 College Football Hub exclusively on VSiN.com.
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