The Liberty Flames continue to burn white-hot, winning six games in a row ahead of their home game against FIU on Saturday. Their most recent victory was a 34-6 win over Kennesaw State last Thursday, which followed a bye, so they’re as a fresh as you can be in Week 9 of the college football season considering they’ve played just one game in the last three weeks – completely negating FIU’s pseudo-bye situation after last playing Tuesday, October 20.
FIU has shown some strength defensively, but the Panthers are completely unreliable offensively, sitting 120th in total scoring, 109th in PPA per play, 98th in success rate and 120th in points per scoring opportunity outside of garbage time since Week 3. They’re not good on standard downs, frequently leaving them in predictable passing situations, which has left QB JJ Kohl out to dry – as evidenced by his CUSA-leading eight interceptions and bottom-three completion percentage.
The Panthers may get a few stops, but it’s going to be hard to cover, much less win the game, if they can’t match Liberty’s scoring. The Flames put up more than 31 points per game, surpassing the 30-point mark in every contest following Week 2. In fact, they’re fifth nationally in PPA per play and sixth in success rate over the last six weeks, while they’re top-10 on standard downs and top-15 in finishing quality drives in that time. On the other side, they haven’t surrendered more than 17 points since that Week 2 contest, and they’ve allowed just 23 combined points in three October games. So, how exactly is an inefficient, unopportunistic offense supposed to score on this team?
The Flames have won five straight games by at least 16 points, and due to FIU’s inefficiencies offensively, in addition to this game being played in Lynchburg, I like that streak to continue this week. Oh, and if you're a believer in this Liberty revenge tour, FIU is one of the teams that beat the Flames last season. Liberty rolls.
FIU vs Liberty best bet: Liberty Flames -13.5 (-115) at the time of publishing. Playable to -15 (-110).
