No. 2 LSU Tigers (-5.5) at No. 16 West Virginia Mountaineers, Total 49.5 |
LSU will put its nation’s longest non-conference regular season winning streak on the line Saturday in traveling to Morgantown in a prime-time event. The Tigers came away with a 20-14 win in last year’s meeting inside Tiger Stadium as 9.5-point home favorites.
The Tigers have’t lost a regular season game against a team from another league since a 26-8 defeat to Virginia Tech in the 2002 season opener. LSU picked up a prime-time victory over a ranked team last week in defeating Mississippi State, 19-6, as 3.5-point road favorites.
Facing ranked competition is no big deal for this team, as the program is 25-13 against AP Top 25 teams under the direction of head coach Les Miles. He still knows that his team has a significant challenge ahead of it.
“The LSU personality will take hold wherever we play,” commented Miles this week during practice. “There is a confidence and an enjoyment of a road venue that this team has now.”
Defense is the name of the game for the No. 2 team in the nation, rated as the No. 3 stop unit against the run, while bringing in the No .6 defense overall. Offensively, LSU is averaging 36 points a game and 344.7 total yards a contest.
The college football betting public will find that the Tigers are 13-14 ATS over the last two-plus seasons and 2-2 ATS as a road favorite.
West Virginia definitely will not feel overmatched in this contest due to nearly pulling off the upset last year, especially when the team has won 63 of its last 80 games. The Mountaineers are a perfect 3-0 this year and come off a 37-31 win over the Maryland Terrapins as one-point road favorites.
“They’ve been in two big games this year and have handled each opponent pretty easily,” commented Mountaineers first-year head coach Dana Holgorsen. “To say it’s not going to be a challenge would be crazy.”
Holgorsen’s ability to lead an offense has rubbed off on quarterback Geno Smith, who threw for a career-high 388 yards and a touchdown last week. He hit numerous targets, which led to a trip of players having over 100 receiving yards.
Scoring points has led to success for the program since the 2000 season, posting a 70-2 record when scoring 30 or more points in a game. That’s not likely to happen here against one of the best defenses in college football.
West Virginia is 15th in the nation in scoring 42 points a game and have compiled 1,013 yards in total offense over its last two contests.
Bettors will find that the Mountaineers are 5-1 ATS as an underdog and 1-1 ATS versus SEC opponents in betting predictions.
The Mountaineers are just 1-8 ATS when playing at home against a team with a winning road record, which will likely be the difference.
