BY HARRY BONDI
I have been handicapping the college bowl games for more than 30 years. Between the extended break in between games, to motivation factors to coaching changes to player suspensions, there are so many factors to consider, picking the winner in these games is unlike anything else in sports betting.
Luckily for you, my staff and I have been rolling up our sleeves and preparing for the upcoming run of college bowl games, a slate that will include 80 teams playing 40 games over the next three to four weeks.
We have been breaking down the matchups ever since they were released and have been speaking with our contacts and media friends from every bowl team on a daily basis.
So far, I have spotted six games where my power ratings have the pointspread OFF by 10 points or more!
As we inch closer to releasing our first bowl selections on Friday and narrow down the choices for our Annual College Bowl “Lock of the Year” selection, here I present five things every handicapper should take into consideration during the bowl season.
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1. Coaching
This is one of the most crucial aspects to consider when handicapping bowl games. The extended time off magnifies how well a team prepares for the game. Some coaches are very good with extra preparation time. Others not so good.
Try to stay away from head coaches who are taking a team to a bowl game for the first time. There are a ton of outside factors – aside from actual Xs and Os – that make bringing a team to a bowl game much more demanding.
A quick example of coaches that have had great success in bowl games has to start with Clemson’s Dabo Swinney, who over the last 7 years has gone 9-1 against the spread and 8-2 straight up in the postseason. Incredibly, in nine of those 10 games the Tigers were the underdog!
Other profitable bowl game coaches include Marshall’s Doc Holliday who is 7-0 SU and ATS, coveringt the spread by 11 points per game, Utah’s Kyle Whittingham, who is 11-2 SU in bowl games and 9-4 ATS and Lousiana Tech’s Skip Holtz, who has gone 7-3 ATS in the bowls.
Another thing to keep in mind is that many coaches have already left their team to move onto greener pastures (Lane Kiffin at FAU and Mike Norvell at Memphis, to name two). You have to consider who is coaching the team in the bowl game in the former head coach’s place. Is it in an interim coach that will get the “substitution teacher” treatment from the players, or is the new coach going to be on the sideline and running practices?
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2. Player absences
Suspensions always seem to come into play during the college bowl game season, and this year has been no different as the news came out this week about players getting suspended at Utah State and Oklahoma. That’s why there is always danger in betting these games too early.
Also, a new trend in college football has players sitting out their bowl game in order to avoid an injury that will hurt their NFL draft status. This started with Christian McCaffrey bailing on his Stanford teammates a few years ago and has gained momentum in recent years. It’s something that you simply have to pay close attention to as many of the players that are sitting out are key performers. Two of the teams this year that may be hit with this new phenomenon are Georgia and Miami-Florida.
3. Motivation
Having a month off to prepare for a game can also be a bad thing because certain teams won’t be excited about going to a faraway place where it’s colder than at home to play what they may deem as a meaningless game. You have to keep these things in mind and that’s why it’s so important to follow these teams closely to find out where the players’ and coaching staff’s mindset is.
Meanwhile, there are some teams out there that are simply excited to play in any bowl game, no matter where or when it is being played. Those are the types of teams that we’ll give extra consideration to being “on” because we know we’ll get their best effort.
4. The venue
Sometimes teams will have an edge by playing at a stadium that is more familiar to them than their opponent. An example would be Boise State playing in the Las Vegas Bowl, a venue it traveled to earlier this year and that it visits every other year.
Elsewhere, instead of “neutral sites,” Florida Atlantic and Hawaii are playing in their home stadiums while teams like Louisiana Tech, Central Florida and California are playing within an earshot of their campus.
5. Balanced offenses rule
Think about it. If a coaching staff is given four weeks to prepare for an opponent that relies heavily on the run, how much easier is it going to be to shut down that offense.
Bottom line: if you give a decent coach with decent players on defense an extended period of time to prepare, that offense is much more likely to get shut down if it’s one-dimensional. So before you bet a bowl team this season, make sure that team is balanced on offense and doesn’t rely too heavily on one or two skill players.