College Football Week 8 Picks: Chaos Has a Hangover
Last Saturday was the college football equivalent of a bar fight at a wedding. Nobody saw it coming, everybody got involved, and by the end of the night, half the guests were on the floor.
Five of the top seven teams in the country lost. Georgia, Notre Dame, Indiana, Alabama, and Texas. All gone. Your Playoff projections are in the garbage, your rankings look like they were assembled by a drunk intern, and somewhere in Austin, a Texas fan is Googling "how to un-commit to a quarterback."
The beauty of college football is that just when you think you've figured everything out, a team favored by two touchdowns loses to a quarterback who looks like he should be selling insurance.
Now comes the hangover.
Week 8 is where we find out who's actually good, who's been living off a nice September, and who's about to discover that last week's miracle doesn't come with a warranty.
We've got six plays on the board, a Costanza special looking to move to 2-0, and absolutely no intention of learning from anybody else's mistakes.
Let's get into it.
Michigan vs. Indiana: OVER 41
Indiana is coming off a heartbreaker, and I mean a heartbreaker. The Hoosiers suffered their first loss in 22 games against Ohio State, and now they walk into the Big House at 6-1 needing to prove that one bad Saturday hasn't broken them.
History suggests they'll be fine. Indiana has never lost back-to-back games under Curt Cignetti, and something tells me he's not the type of coach who spends the week handing out participation trophies and reminding everyone to believe in themselves.
But I'm not here to pick a winner. I'm here to pick points.
And I loved what I saw from Michigan's offense after they finally went to the bullpen and brought in Tommy Carr.
Suddenly, the Wolverines had a pulse. Receivers were getting involved, the offense looked alive, and Michigan remembered that the forward pass has been legal for approximately 120 years.
The season-long numbers aren't particularly flattering. Michigan ranks 57th nationally in offensive success rate and 52nd in adjusted EPA per play. The skeptics will point to those numbers and tell you this isn't an offense worth trusting.
Fine. But those numbers also include the pre-bullpen version of Michigan, which was about as exciting as watching someone assemble IKEA furniture.
The quarterback change gives this offense a different dimension, and I don't exactly have tremendous respect for Indiana's secondary. Ohio State just handed everyone the blueprint.
Meanwhile, Indiana still ranks third nationally in net adjusted EPA per play and second in net yards per play. Whatever happened last week, this remains one of the most efficient teams in college football.
I expect the Hoosiers to respond offensively, and I think Michigan can contribute enough to make this total look awfully low.
A pissed-off Indiana offense, a Michigan team with new life under center, and a number sitting at 41?
I'll take my chances.
The Pick: Over 41
Ole Miss at Texas: UNDER 54.5
Things in Austin are going about as smoothly as a family Thanksgiving after somebody brings up politics.
Texas has dropped back-to-back games to Oklahoma and Florida, and the conversation has gone from Arch Manning winning the Heisman to whether Arch Manning should even be starting.
That's quite a turnaround.
When your fan base is debating the backup quarterback in late October, it's probably safe to assume your offense isn't exactly the Greatest Show on Turf.
And unfortunately for Texas, Ole Miss appears to have remembered how to play defense.
Pete Golding, the former defensive coordinator who took over as head coach after Lane Kiffin bolted for LSU, used the bye week to get his defense straightened out.
I'd say it worked.
The Rebels dismantled No. 13 Missouri 31-3 last Saturday, holding the Tigers to just 39 rushing yards on 26 attempts.
That's 1.5 yards per carry.
My grandmother could average 1.5 yards per carry walking to the mailbox, and she's not exactly a threat to bounce one outside.
Golding said afterward that holding Missouri to three points said a lot about his defense. Hard to argue with the man.
Now that same defense gets a Texas offense struggling to throw the football, establish any consistency, or figure out which quarterback gives it the best chance to win.
And Ole Miss isn't exactly approaching this game with an air-raid philosophy either. Golding emphasized the importance of running the football and stopping the run against Missouri.
That's the formula I expect again.
Establish the ground game, control possession, limit mistakes, and make Texas prove it can sustain drives.
Both teams have reasons to keep this game physical and relatively conservative. That means a running clock, fewer possessions, and a lot of pressure on an already shaky Texas offense to finish drives.
Ole Miss can put points on the board, but I don't trust Texas to do its share of the heavy lifting.
If the Longhorns are settling for field goals while the Rebels are chewing up clock, getting to 55 becomes a pretty tall order.
The Pick: Under 54.5
LSU at Auburn: OVER 51
Auburn just beat Georgia.
I'll give everyone a moment to process that sentence.
The Tigers knocked off the Bulldogs, the Plains are euphoric, Toomer's Corner probably has a nationwide shortage of toilet paper to answer for, and every Auburn fan has spent the last seven days acting like they personally recovered the game-winning fumble.
Now LSU comes to town.
And LSU means Lane Kiffin.
The same Lane Kiffin who left Ole Miss last November in dramatic fashion to take over a conference rival. The man has never met a storyline he couldn't make more entertaining, and I have a hard time imagining him arriving at Auburn with the intention of winning a 17-13 snoozefest.
This is a fascinating spot because both teams have something to prove.
Auburn wants to show that beating Georgia wasn't a one-week miracle. LSU wants to remind everyone that it's still capable of making noise in the SEC.
And when you combine an emotionally charged home crowd with an aggressive offensive coach on the opposite sideline, things can get interesting quickly.
The biggest concern with this over is the possibility that Auburn comes out flat after such an enormous emotional win. That's real. We've seen plenty of teams celebrate a massive upset all week and then forget they have another game to play.
But I'm betting on the opposite.
I think Auburn comes out feeding off that crowd, LSU answers with its own offensive aggression, and this game opens up as the pressure builds.
The key is getting both teams involved early. If neither side can dictate a slow, methodical pace, the game has a chance to turn into a second-half shootout.
And if this thing is sitting somewhere around 27-24 entering the fourth quarter, I'll be a very happy man.
Kiffin gets his points, Auburn gets its moments, and the defenses eventually start looking like they've been chasing people around a parking lot for three hours.
Give me the track meet.
The Pick: Over 51
Iowa at Minnesota: MINNESOTA +7.5
Iowa football is the most predictable thing in America.
Punt. Punt. Field goal. Defensive touchdown. Punt again. Win 17-10. Act like you just reinvented the sport.
It's a beautiful tradition, provided you don't actually have to watch it.
The Hawkeyes enter this rivalry at 5-1, while Minnesota sits at 4-2. Iowa is the better team on paper, and I'm not particularly interested in arguing otherwise.
But being the better team and covering more than a touchdown on the road are two very different things.
Especially when your offense treats the end zone like a restricted government facility.
This handicap is all about possessions and margin.
Iowa wants to play physical football, control the clock, win the field-position battle, and let its defense dictate the game. That's a perfectly reasonable way to win football games.
It's also a difficult way to blow teams out.
Every punt, every three-yard run, and every possession that eats six minutes off the clock makes those 7.5 points more valuable.
Minnesota doesn't need to dominate this game. The Gophers don't even need to play particularly well.
They just need to hang around.
And in a low-scoring Big Ten rivalry, hanging around is practically a constitutional right.
If Iowa wins 17-13, 20-14, or 23-17, I couldn't care less how ugly it looks. My ticket cashes just the same.
Seven and a half points in a game where both teams might need a search warrant to locate the end zone?
I'll take the home dog.
The Pick: Minnesota +7.5
Oklahoma at Mississippi State: UNDER 46.5
We've got a little reunion in Starkville, and unfortunately for anyone who enjoys offensive football, it might be the kind where nobody has anything nice to say.
This is the first meeting between Oklahoma and Mississippi State, and Bulldogs head coach Jeff Lebby gets a shot at his former employer.
Lebby knows the Sooners. The Sooners know Lebby. Everybody knows everybody's tendencies.
It's like playing poker against your ex-wife. Nobody's bluffing anybody.
But the bigger story is Mississippi State's quarterback situation.
Kamario Taylor has been one of the SEC's more productive quarterbacks, throwing 17 touchdowns against four interceptions. Unfortunately, he's also been dealing with a foot injury that's turned his availability into a weekly guessing game.
Taylor played through the pain against Alabama, struggled, and turned the football over three times. Then he missed the LSU game entirely.
Without him, Mississippi State got shut out for the first time in six seasons.
Zero points.
The scoreboard operator could've gone home at halftime and nobody would've noticed.
Sophomore Parker Puckett stepped in against LSU and finished 16 of 26 for 121 yards and an interception.
That's not an offensive performance. That's a punt delivery service with occasional paperwork.
Here's the beauty of this under: I like it regardless of who starts.
If Taylor sits, Mississippi State is relying on a backup quarterback who just demonstrated how difficult it is to move the football against SEC competition.
If Taylor plays, he's a mobile quarterback dealing with a bad foot. Take away his ability to escape and create, and suddenly you're asking him to operate from the pocket behind an offensive line that isn't exactly built like the Great Wall of China.
Neither scenario screams offensive explosion.
And Oklahoma isn't coming into this game with a particularly convincing offensive résumé either.
The Sooners have shown they can win with defense, including their victory over Texas, but three losses tell you the offense hasn't consistently held up its end of the bargain.
John Mateer is coming off a three-interception performance in a loss, which makes me think Oklahoma will be perfectly content to simplify things.
Run the football. Protect possession. Don't give Mississippi State short fields. Let the defense do the work.
That's not a recipe for 60 points. That's a recipe for a lot of third-and-sevens and frustrated offensive coordinators.
A compromised Mississippi State offense, an Oklahoma team that doesn't need to take unnecessary risks, and two coaching staffs familiar with each other's tendencies.
This has ugly written all over it.
And ugly is exactly what I want.
The Pick: Under 46.5
North Texas Team Total vs. Navy: OVER 32.5
North Texas might be the most entertaining football team in America that nobody actually watches.
They score. They score again. You get up to grab a beer, come back, and they've scored twice more.
It's beautiful.
Now the Mean Green get a 2-4 Navy team whose defense has the unfortunate responsibility of trying to slow down one of the country's most explosive offenses.
I have tremendous respect for service academy athletes. These guys are going to graduate and do things that actually matter in the world.
Some of them will command submarines.
Unfortunately, that doesn't mean they can command a seam route.
Navy's biggest weapon in this matchup isn't necessarily its defense. It's the triple-option offense and the ability to keep North Texas standing on the sideline.
That's the legitimate concern with this play.
If Navy can put together long, methodical drives and shorten the game, North Texas might not get as many possessions as we're accustomed to seeing.
But here's why I'm willing to live with that risk.
North Texas doesn't need 12-play drives to score touchdowns.
This offense is built to strike quickly. A few explosive plays can produce seven points before Navy has even finished adjusting its defensive alignment.
And if North Texas gets out to an early two-score lead, Navy suddenly has a problem.
The triple option is wonderful when you're controlling the game. It's considerably less wonderful when you're trailing by 17 and the clock is becoming your worst enemy.
At that point, Navy has to get more aggressive, the game can open up, and North Texas starts getting the possessions we need.
We're asking this offense for 33 points.
Four touchdowns and a field goal.
Against this matchup, I think that's a very reasonable expectation.
Navy can have the submarines. I'll take the touchdowns.
The Pick: North Texas Team Total Over 32.5
The Costanza Play of the Week (1-0): SOUTH CAROLINA ML
For the new readers, welcome to the least scientific segment in sports gambling.
The Costanza Play is based on one of the greatest philosophical discoveries in television history.
George Costanza realized that every decision he'd ever made was wrong. Therefore, if he simply did the opposite of what his instincts told him, he'd have to start being right.
The man went from unemployed and living with his parents to working for the New York Yankees.
That's a better career trajectory than most college football coaches.
So once a week, we're embracing the philosophy.
The Costanza Play is 1-0 on the season, which technically makes George our most successful employee.
This week's victim: Tennessee.
Every natural instinct says to ride the Volunteers.
They just knocked off Alabama. They're riding high. The fan base is euphoric. Rocky Top has been played approximately 900,000 times since Saturday, and half the state is probably still hungover.
Normally, you'd look at a team coming off a win like that and think it's finally figured things out.
Which is exactly why we're doing the opposite.
Tennessee now has to travel to Columbia and face a South Carolina team that's spent the entire week hearing about how wonderful the Volunteers are.
Nobody's talking about the Gamecocks.
Nobody's giving them much respect.
And Tennessee is coming off the kind of emotional victory that can make the following Saturday feel like an inconvenient obligation.
This is the classic college football hangover spot.
You spend all week celebrating the biggest win of your season, reading your own press clippings, and hearing how you've turned the corner.
Then suddenly it's 3:30 in Columbia, the crowd is losing its mind, you're down 10-3, and you're wondering why nobody warned you that South Carolina also has a football team.
I'm not saying Tennessee isn't talented.
I'm saying this is precisely the kind of game where talent gets caught looking ahead, looking backward, or looking anywhere except at the team standing across the line of scrimmage.
George Costanza would see Tennessee's win over Alabama and immediately start shopping for South Carolina merchandise.
And who am I to argue with a man who once worked for the Yankees?
We're not taking the points, either.
If we're going to be stupid, we're going to be stupid with conviction.
The Costanza Pick: South Carolina Moneyline
The Week 8 Card
Game
Pick
Michigan vs. Indiana Over 41
Ole Miss at Texas Under 54.5
LSU at Auburn Over 51
Minnesota +7.5
Oklahoma at Mississippi State Under 46.5
North Texas TT Over 32.5
South Carolina ML (Costanza)
Final Thoughts
Last week, five of the top seven teams lost, the rankings got thrown into a blender, and half the country woke up Sunday morning wondering whether their favorite team was actually any good.
That's college football.
One week you're a national championship contender. The next week you're explaining to your wife why you spent $400 on tickets to watch your quarterback throw three interceptions against a team that was supposed to be an easy win.
And the best part?
We're going to do this all over again Saturday.
Six plays, one Costanza special, and a full slate of teams trying to prove last week was either a fluke or the beginning of something much worse.
Shop your numbers, don't chase bad lines, and remember that being right about a game means absolutely nothing if you bet the wrong price.
Chaos took last week.
We're taking this one.
See you Sunday.
