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LSU (-10.0) versus Florida
Florida’s 17-20 loss to Mississippi as a 12 point home favorite last week certainly doesn’t breed confidence in the Gators heading into this game. But, that loss sets up Florida in an incredibly good 50-10 ATS conference road underdog bounce-back situation that won last week with Kansas State at Texas. I love this angle because it’s gone 18-2 the last 4 years since I discovered it in ’99. However, I am still reluctant to do more than just lean with the Gators in this game because my mathematical model favors LSU by 14 points and I’d hate to give up 4 points of line value (although the situation is worth 6 ½ points). I went against Florida last week as a Strong Opinion and cited how Ron Zook was making a mistake using freshman Chris Leak at quarterback instead of Ingle Martin. While Leak will probably be a great quarterback one day, he has been worse than average so far this season, averaging 6.7 yards per pass play against teams that combine to allow an average of 7.0 yppp on defense. LSU has a very good pass defense (4.3 yppp allowed to teams that average 5.8 yppp on offense), so Leak will have his work cut out for him today. Florida’s chance to stay close in this game hinges on a defense that should be better than what they’ve shown (5.3 yards per play allowed to teams that combine to average 5.5 yppl on offense). LSU is just mediocre offensively (5.5 yppl against teams that allow 5.6 yppl), so a fired up Florida defense could keep this game close. I hate passing on that 50-10 ATS angle, but I’ll have to just lean on Florida in this game rather than making them a play.
Florida’s 17-20 loss to Mississippi as a 12 point home favorite last week certainly doesn’t breed confidence in the Gators heading into this game. But, that loss sets up Florida in an incredibly good 50-10 ATS conference road underdog bounce-back situation that won last week with Kansas State at Texas. I love this angle because it’s gone 18-2 the last 4 years since I discovered it in ’99. However, I am still reluctant to do more than just lean with the Gators in this game because my mathematical model favors LSU by 14 points and I’d hate to give up 4 points of line value (although the situation is worth 6 ½ points). I went against Florida last week as a Strong Opinion and cited how Ron Zook was making a mistake using freshman Chris Leak at quarterback instead of Ingle Martin. While Leak will probably be a great quarterback one day, he has been worse than average so far this season, averaging 6.7 yards per pass play against teams that combine to allow an average of 7.0 yppp on defense. LSU has a very good pass defense (4.3 yppp allowed to teams that average 5.8 yppp on offense), so Leak will have his work cut out for him today. Florida’s chance to stay close in this game hinges on a defense that should be better than what they’ve shown (5.3 yards per play allowed to teams that combine to average 5.5 yppl on offense). LSU is just mediocre offensively (5.5 yppl against teams that allow 5.6 yppl), so a fired up Florida defense could keep this game close. I hate passing on that 50-10 ATS angle, but I’ll have to just lean on Florida in this game rather than making them a play.