Week 1 College Football Recap

Early season college football is always tricky to bet. You don't really know a whole lot about any of the teams, and half of the teams you do know something about are playing against a community college team. There were a LOT of teams favored by a big number this past weekend, but there were also a few decent matchups mixed in. Let's go to the scoreboard:

Notable Big Favorites That Covered

• #16 Georgia Tech -41 against Alcorn State. Ga Tech won 69-6
• #17 Ole Miss -39 against UT Martin, Ole Miss won 76-3
• #9 Georgia -35 against UL Monroe, UGA won 51-14
• #12 Clemson -34 against Wofford, Clemson won 49-10
• #13 UCLA -17.5 against Virginia, UCLA won 34-16
• #18 Arkansas -32.5 against UTEP, Arkansas won 48-13
• #25 Tennessee -21.5 against Bowling Green, Tenn won 59-30
• NC State -26 against Troy, NC State won 49-21
• #19 Oklahoma -31 against Akron, Oklahoma won 41-3
• #10 Florida State -27.5 against Texas State, FSU won 59-16
• #8 USC -27 against Arkansas State, USC won 55-6

Notable Big Favorites That Didn't Cover

• #2 TCU -16.5 against Minnesota. TCU won 23-17
• #22 Arizona -32.5 against UTSA, Arizona won 42-32
• #5 Michigan State 16.5 against Western Michigan, MSU won 37-24
• #4 Baylor -36 against SMU, Baylor won 56-21
• Washington State -30 against Portland State, Portland State won 24-17 (woof)
• Wyoming -18.5 against North Dakota, UND won 24-13 (woof)
• Indiana -20.5 against Southern Illinois, Indiana won 48-47 (woof)
• #24 Missouri -41 against SE Missouri, Mizzou won 34-3
• #7 Oregon -35 against Eastern Washington, Oregon won 61-42
• #26 Mississippi State -21 against Southern Mississippi, MSU won 34-16

Other Games, Like Maybe Some Featuring Two Decent Teams

• Utah -5 against Michigan, Utah won 24-17
• #23 Boise State -12 against Washington, BSU won 16-13 (but scored 0 second half points)
• #21 Stanford -10 against Northwestern, NWU won 16-6
• #6 Auburn -10.5 against Louisville, Auburn won 31-24
• Nebraska -5 against BYU, BYU won 33-28 (on a last-second Hail Brigham)
• Penn State -6 against Temple, Temple won 27-10 (PHIL-LY! PHIL-LY! PHIL-LY!)
• Texas A&M -3 against #15 Arizona State, TXAM won 38-17
• Notre Dame -8.5 against Texas, ND won 38-3
• #3 Alabama -12 against #20 Wisconsin, Alabama won 35-17
• #1 Ohio State -13.5 against Va Tech, OSU won 42-24

Let's break that down into some trends/rules for the coming weeks:

1. The SEC is the best conference in football.

Win the only game of the week between ranked teams. Five big favorites all take care of business by a combined 237 points. Blow out a top-15 team. Beat the fourth- or fifth-best team in the ACC. The only SEC loss of the weekend was Vanderbilt, and I'm not even sure they count as a real SEC team. Kentucky even managed to take care of business. If you are an SEC hater, you might want to keep it quiet this season. 

2. The Big XII and Pac 12 stink. 

Stanford lost to Northwestern. Arizona State lost to Texas A&M. Nobody expected much from Washington this year, but they lost to Boise State. And Arizona, Baylor, TCU, and Texas all didn't cover. Your scorching hot take of the day: this year's playoff will be Ohio State and three SEC teams. 

3. Betting a big number is a complete coin flip. 

Like I said, nobody knows anything going into the season. There are half a dozen teams that are going to drop significantly in this week's rankings, and at least that many that are going to shoot up. Betting on a "good" team to cover a huge spread can make sense, or it can blow up in your face. 

4. The Week 1 Recap Big Board:

*Note: LSU was off this week because their game was cancelled due to weather.