College Football Picks Week 11 2024
Last week was a mess, led by Virginia Tech. The Hokies surprisingly were without QB Kyron Drones and star RB Bhayshul Tuten due to injury. They still jumped out to a 21-3 lead only to completely disintegrate late against Syracuse.
The overall story of the season is a bit better than the numbers you see below- I have a lot of futures bets (Indiana to make Playoff, BYU to make playoff, SMU to make ACC title game etc.) that are looking quite good. I haven’t included them in the “preseason bets” tally because they’re not settled yet, but I reckon I have about an extra 20-25 units in expected profit in these sorts of bets.
Week 1: -0.36 units
Week 2: -0.33 units
Week 3: -5.18 units
Week 4: -4.27 units
Week 5: +5.28 units
Week 6: +8.10 units
Week 7: -3.00 units
Week 8: +1.55 units
Week 9: +0.64 units
Week 10: -7.27 units
Preseason Bets: +4.57 units
Total: -0.27 units
UNLV @ Hawai’i (Saturday, 8 PM Central)
Hawai’i is a vastly improved team this year. HC Timmy Chang took over a complete dumpster fire from previous HC Todd Graham and it has taken him some time to right the ship. However, he finally has a roster full of his recruits now and it is paying dividends in back to back upset wins over Nevada and Fresno State. UNLV is a solid top 50 team but travel to the islands is always tough for mainland teams and the market has not caught up to how improved Hawai’i is.
Hawai’i +13 -110 (2 units)
Minnesota @ Rutgers (Saturday, 11 AM Central)
Rutgers had a solid season going in September but the bottom has completely fallen out for them. They lost at home to a bad UCLA team and were shellacked by Wisconsin and USC. Minnesota might just be the best team in college football that no one is talking about- they’re up to 33rd in my ratings- and has been hugely improved on offense in the last few weeks.
Minnesota -4.5 -110 (2 units)
Miami @ Georgia Tech (Saturday, 11 AM Central)
Miami has survived their fair share of close calls this year, to say the least. Their offense is the best in the sport but their defense is now outside my top 40- no serious national title contender should be getting torn up by the Duke offense. Georgia Tech fell off the national radar after they lost to Syracuse, but their schedule has been brutal and I think they are unlucky to only be 5-4. Georgia Tech is optimistic that QB Haynes King will return from injury in time for this game and I think the Yellow Jackets have a chance at the upset.
Georgia Tech +13 -110 (2 units)
Rice @ Memphis (Friday, 8 PM Central)
Rice fired HC Mike Bloomgren before last week’s game and immediately put up their best performance of the season in a dominating win over Navy. I’ve heard rumblings that Bloomgren had lost the locker room so I’m not shocked to see a sudden improvement. Memphis is falling apart a bit- they’ve underperformed by double digits in each of their last three games- and I think they’re a bit overrated.
Rice +12.5 -110 (1 unit)
Indiana to make the Playoff -150 (2 units)
Indiana has three games left on their schedule- home games against Michigan and Purdue and a road game at Ohio State. The Hoosiers are 13.5 point favorites against Michigan this weekend, and Purdue might be the worst power conference team in the country. Even if Indiana gets killed by Ohio State (which is probable- my model has Ohio State as the best team in the country by a decent margin), I still think an 11-1 Indiana is a reasonably safe bet to make the playoff.