Your Week 11 college football viewing guide: Breaking down/predicting Michigan vs. Wisconsin, plus other key games from around the country
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Apologies for last week. I had written north of 15,000 words covering coaching stuff and the Michigan-MSU aftermath, so I ran out of time and words to write a formal viewing guide for Week 10. I did post my predictions on Twitter, though, and I hope you used them to your advantage, because my hot streak seems to be continuing.
I went 7-2 against the spread, including my third straight week with my upset pick winning its game outright.
Let’s try and do it again this week. Here are my predictions for the entire Big Ten slate, plus three other games outside of the conference that are worth watching, with predictions for those, too.
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Week 11 Viewing Guide
Wisconsin at Michigan, 7:30 pm (abc)
This is such a hard game to break down because of so much COVID uncertainty. Reading the tea leaves, I actually don’t expect Graham Mertz to play. And in most normal circumstances, you’d expect a team that hasn’t played in weeks having to go into Ann Arbor with a third-string QB would be a pretty safe bet to take an L. But if you’ve seen Michigan play the last two weeks, you know these are anything but normal circumstances.
I have zero confidence in Michigan beating this Wisconsin team — COVID warts and all. This is a Michigan team that hasn’t held a lead since October 24th, and it’s below .500 despite having the toughest parts of its schedule remaining to be played.
Couple that with the fact that it looks like Michigan will be playing without its two bookends on the defensive line after we saw how poorly that went for Michigan last weekend without its anchors in the offensive trenches, and I just don’t see this ending well for Michigan. Nor do I expect it to be particularly close.
Give me Wisconsin by a couple touchdowns. I’d love to be proven wrong. But I don’t expect to be.
Line: Wisconsin -3.5
Prediction: Wisconsin 31, Michigan 17
Iowa at Minnesota, 7 pm (FS1 — Friday)
It’s odd that a matchup between a pair of 1-2 teams would be the non-Michigan conference game that intrigues me the most on this week’s Big Ten slate, but here we are. Both Iowa and Minnesota were expected to be legitimate candidates for the Big Ten West crown this fall, but both teams limped out of the gates to an 0-2 start. Fortunately for fans of these programs, both schools seemed to return to the form most expected them to have this season in convincing wins last week. Iowa destroyed Michigan State, 49-7, while Minnesota cruised past Illinois, 41-14.
Mo Ibrahim is looking like the most dominant RB in America from a statistical standpoint so far. A traditionally stout Iowa defense should serve as his biggest challenge of the young season. But even if the Hawkeyes can zero in on Minnesota’s running game, I expect Rashod Bateman to be able to torch the Iowa secondary — the same Iowa secondary that allowed Purdue’s David Bell to put up a 13-121-3 line in their opener last month. Give me the Gophers in a game that could still technically keep their faint Big Ten West title hopes alive.
Line: Iowa -3.5
Prediction: Minnesota 28, Iowa 24
Indiana at Michigan State, noon (abc)
Going from a game I’m really interested in seeing to a game I’m going to avoid at all costs to avoid triggering PTSD. It’s Indiana vs. Michigan State in the We Beat Michigan Bowl.
Indiana is the better team. And by a pretty signficant margin. I expected this line to be in the comfortable double digits. When it’s not, there’s usually a reason why, but I’’m not going to overthink things here and I’ll just trust my gut. Give me the Hoosiers by double digits.
Line: Indiana -7
Prediction: Indiana 31, Michigan State 21
Illinois at Rutgers, noon (BTN)
Ready to live in a world where Rutgers has a better record than Michigan in the middle of November? I have very little reason to expect the Scarlet Knights to drop this game to Illinois. The Illini are pretty bad as-is, and when you throw in the issues that COVID has caused with that depth chart — particularly on the offense — and it’s hard for me to see a team like Rutgers stumble in a game like this. It’s weird to say, given that it was a 22-point loss, but I was probably more impressed with Rutgers’ performance against Ohio State last week than I was with their opening weekend win over Michigan State. I know Tom Allen, Mike Locksley and Jeff Brohm may have a thing or two to say about it, but I think Greg Schiano should be in major consideration for Big Ten Coach of the Year once this hellseason comes to a much-needed end.
Line: Rutgers 34, Illinois 21
Prediction: Rutgers -6
Penn State at Nebraska, noon (FS1)
This week’s game is a real shame, because it guarantees either James Franklin or Scott Frost will no longer be among the ranks of the winless coaches this fall. I think Penn State grades a little higher on the disappointment scale given the expectations the Nittany Lions had heading into this season, but both coach has to be pretty distraught to be sitting without a win at this stage of the season. Nebraska has only played in two games, given a COVID cancellation against Wisconsin, and one of the losses came to Ohio State, so it’s hard to hold that against Scott Frost and Co. But a Year 3 Scott Frost program has no business losing to a Northwestern team that was 3-9 in 2019.
I’m probably still putting too much weight into postseason expectations, because Penn State has shown next to nothing on the field over the last two weeks, but I’m still going to ride with the Nittany Lions this weekend for no reason other than the fact that I think Nebraska has no way of slowing down Jahan Dotson in the passing game.
Line: Penn State -3
Prediction: Penn State 35, Nebraska 27
Northwestern at Purdue, 7:30 (BTN)
If someone had told you three weeks ago that these two schools would be playing for first place in the Big Ten West at the midway point of the conference season, they probably would have laughed in your face. But if Wisconsin ends up missing another game this fall, these two schools have a two-game cushion over its next closest competitors in the Big Ten West.
Even though Northwestern is the school that’s earned a nod in the AP Top 25, I’m actually a little more impressed with Purdue so far this far. The Boilers have been able to go on their run without star player Rondale Moore. It sounds like Moore is a game-time decision this week, but there’s some confidence within the program that he’ll be playing on Saturday. Whenever he does return (and is close to full strength), this offense is going to be the conference’s most dangerous offense not named Ohio State, because David Bell has taken the baton and ran with in in Moore’s absence over the last season and a half. I’m riding the Wildcats to win this one outright — but I’m taking Purdue and the points against the spread because I think this will be the closest game of the week in conference play.
Line: Northwestern -3.5
Prediction: Northwestern 27, Purdue 24
Three non-Big Ten games worth watching
This week's slate of games never looked great, but it looked much more tolerable when Alabama, Ohio State, Texas A&M, Georgia, Auburn, Memphis and others were scheduled to play before all of their games (and more than a handful of others) got nixed because of COVID. So it’s certainly much slimmer pickings for “circle-on-your-calendar” candidates.
Miami (FL) at Virginia Tech, noon (ESPN2)
A matchup between top-10 Miami (FL) and an unranked Virginia Tech squad that’s been relatively underwhelming this season should be an easy pick, right? Many would say yes, but Vegas isn’t one of them. The Hokies are actually slight favorites in this one despite their loss to Liberty last week.
But … why? Not only did the Hokies lose last week, but star RB Khalil Herbert missed the majority of the game, and might be on the shelf again this week. The good news for the Hokies is they have shown they can be effective on the ground even without Herbert. And that’s not thanks to Herbert’s backup RB. It’s because Hendon Hooker has emerged as one of the most dangerous running QBs in the country.
Another QB that has earned that title will be on the opposite sideline on Saturday: Miami (FL) QB D’Eriq King. He’s been mostly as-advertised for the Hurricanes after transferring in from Houston. Not 100% consistent, but dynamic and dangerous. Really, a lot like Hooker has been for the Hokies.
Ultimately it comes down to who you trust more. And I can’t get past the fact that Miami (FL) hasn’t had a comfortable win since September, and only one of the contests during that span was against a ranked opponent — a 25-point loss to Clemson. Last week’s Liberty game didn’t do much to instill confidence in the hearts of many Virginia Tech fans, but maybe it’ll light a fire into a Hokie team that’s playing for Justin Fuente’s job. I’ll take the Hokies in a close one.
Line: Virginia Tech -2
Prediction: Virginia Tech 31, Miami (FL) 27
Notre Dame at Boston College, 3:30 (abc) — bonus: also serving as my upset watch for the week
Ok, maybe I’m getting cocky now that I have more than a 50% success rate outright with my upset picks of the week in this column. But it’s go big or go home, right?
Boston College is surprisingly competent in Year 1 of the Jeff Hafley Era. The Eagles are 5-3, with all three losses coming against ranked teams. They were not only in contention, but very, very close to winning two of those three games — against then-No. 12 North Carolina (a 26-22 loss where a game-tying two-point conversion attempt in the final minute turned into a UNC interception returned for TD) and against then-No. 1 (a 34-28 loss where Boston College held an 18-point lead).
Some teams play up to its competition. And I think Boston College is one of those teams. And on the other hand, you have a Notre Dame team in a classic letdown situation, coming off one of its program’s biggest wins in the modern era. The Irish have looked really good at times this season (with its win over No. 1 Clemson last week obviously being exhibit A), but they’ve also look susceptible to an upset at times this season, too (anyone else remember that 12-7 home win over Louisville last month?)
In a weird season, weird things are going to happen. It’s tough to pinpoint when those weird things will happen, but this just feels right. Just brace yourselves for the Hafley-to-Michigan chatter to pick up if this upset does come to fruition.
Line: Notre Dame -11.5
Prediction: Boston College 24, Notre Dame 21
SMU at Tulsa, 7 pm (ESPN2)
If you’re in the mood for a different night game to watch once Wisconsin jumps out to a multi-touchdown lead over Michigan, might I suggest this one? SMU and Tulsa are squaring off head-to-head in what will likely end up being a play-in game for the right to take on Cincinnati in the AAC Championship Game. I think SMU is the better team here, but the Mustangs have a recent track record of coming up short in big games that it needs to win.
This game really depends on which Tulsa team you’re going to see. And it’s pretty hard to project which team that may be because we haven’t gotten to see the Golden Hurricane in action much this fall. Tulsa has had seven games scheduled so far this season and it has only gotten to play in four of them. The first two games made Tulsa look really dangerous — a 16-7 loss at Oklahoma State where Tulsa led at halftime, and then a 34-26 win over UCF. In Tulsa’s two most recent games, though, it’s been a couple of “meh” performances. A somewhat comfortable win over a South Florida team that could be one of the worst teams in college football this fall, and then a close win over fellow AAC cellar dwellar East Carolina.
I think Shane Buechele makes some big plays, but SMU’s inability to establish a ground game and some big plays late will give Tulsa the win here.
Line: Tulsa -1
Prediction: Tulsa 34, SMU 31
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