Following a long and eventful college football regular season, the most wonderful time of the year is finally here. Bowl season might not be as essential across the college football landscape as it once was, but it still presents bettors with a plethora of games to handicap and wager on. The action continues on Wednesday with a number of games, including a College Football Playoff showdown between the Miami Hurricanes and Ohio State Buckeyes in the Cotton Bowl to cap off the proceedings.
With another weekday slate of bowl games upon us, it’s time to get into this Wednesday card with my best bets column. We have gotten back on track in the column with a 7-4 mark over the last couple of weeks, so let’s keep that momentum going through the end of bowl season! Let’s take a look at my pair of CFB best bets for Wednesday, and you can also find out all of our expert CFB picks for every Bowl and College Football Playoff game.
CFB best bet: Miami Hurricanes vs Ohio State Buckeyes 1st Half Under 21.5 (-125)
Odds available at FanDuel Sportsbook at time of publishing. Playable to Under 21.
The only College Football Playoff game of the evening takes place at AT&T Stadium between Miami and Ohio State in a game that projects to be a defensive struggle. Even indoors, these are a couple of the best defenses in the country, and I expect both units to dictate how this game is played. Both sides rank inside the top 12 in yards per play and 3rd-down conversion rate allowed this year, to go along with top-10 marks in success rate allowed and EPA per play (CFB-Graphs). We just saw the Hurricanes shut down Texas A&M on the road in their last contest, and while Ohio State’s offense is extremely talented, the Buckeyes don’t have the explosiveness on a down-to-down basis that the Aggies do, and they also play at one of the slowest paces in the nation.
On the other side of the ball, this is a Miami offense that also operates at an extremely slow pace, as the Hurricanes sit outside the top 100 in seconds per play. Furthermore, this is the best defense that Carson Beck will have faced all season long to this point, and we just saw how he struggled to generate any kind of success in the passing game against Texas A&M a few weeks back. With that in mind, it’s very possible that Miami will look to lean on its strong ground game to chew up some clock and put the Hurricanes into a field position battle with an Ohio State team that is much more comfortable when playing ahead this season. All of this points to a slower start to this game, which gives us a bit of value on the first half under while it’s still above 21.
Read our full Miami vs Ohio State predictions on the side and total for the Cotton Bowl
CFB best bet: Michigan Wolverines +7.5 over Texas Longhorns (-115)
Odds available at Fanatics Sportsbook at time of publishing. Playable to Michigan +7.
It’s pretty clear that you are paying a premium on Texas in this matchup. After all, the Longhorns are going to be without a number of key players in what is essentially a meaningless game for a team that had aspirations of qualifying for the College Football Playoff throughout the season. Texas will be without 7 of its top 11 defenders in terms of snap count in this game, along with the excellent running back duo of Quintrevion Wisner and CJ Baxter, which leaves the Longhorns without a lot of pop on offense as well. It remains to be seen if Texas will be motivated enough to put up the offense necessary to win this game by margin, especially against a pretty stout Michigan defense.
As for the Wolverines, quarterback Bryce Underwood will play on Wednesday, and not only is running back Justice Haynes also expected to suit up, but Michigan will have Biff Poggi on the sidelines as the interim head coach for this matchup. The Wolverines essentially have a full roster heading into this contest, and I expect them to play hard for Poggi in a game that could mirror what we saw from Michigan last year during bowl season. This is a prideful group and I’d expect them to compete until the final whistle against a Texas roster that will be extremely depleted on Thursday.
Check out our NCAAF predictions for EVERY Bowl and College Football Playoff game
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