Inside the Stats
By Marc Lawrence
VegasInsider.com
Each week we take a look inside the numbers, from both a statistical and a pointspread aspect, on the college football and NFL cards.
Here are this week’s findings…
Standing 8-Count
Imagine being a 10-win team last year and now a losing squad at this stage of the season. How difficult of a job is it for a coach to get his team psyched to play this week, you ask? Plenty.
According to our database, losing teams in Game Eight of the season who won 10 or more games last year are 23-43-1 ATS since 1980, including 15-40-1 ATS If these same teams allow 21 or more PPG on the season.
A total of three teams on this week’s card figure to taking ‘Standing 8-Counts,’ namely Arkansas State, Kansas State and Tulsa.
Talk about being staggered: after going 32-8 combined in 2012, this triumvirate enters this week sporting a cumulative 7-13 record!
Worse, if these wobbly standing 8-counters are off a win in their last game, they become a 5-10 SU and 2-13 ATS punching bag, including 0-10 ATS when off a double-digit win. With that, look for the K-State Wildcats to take it squarely on the chin this week.
Sound the bell.
Tougher Than The Rest
College football teams who face the toughest schedule one season are solid point-spread plays the next season.
That’s confirmed by a rock-solid 56% ATS overall mark on nearly 400 plays since 1980.
Bring them into a game off a SU/ATS loss and they improve to 60% (55-37). Better yet, when they are playing off back-to-back SU/ATS losses they zoom to 19-4 ATS.
We’ll see just how tough the Florida Gators are this Saturday when they take on Georgia in the ‘World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party’ in Jacksonville.
Smoke And Mirrors
Following up with our ‘leaking oil’ theory (playing against favorites who have lost the stats in each of their previous three games), and after a tumultuous run the past two weeks, these plays now stand at 11-15 ATS overall this season, including 8-10 in CFB and 3-5 in the NFL.
This week’s plays:
NCAAFB: Air Force, Rutgers
NFL: Indianapolis
ITS
Teams that are 100% perfect “In The Stats” (ITS) in all games played this season are these perfect squads.
NCAAFB: Arizona State, Baylor, BYU, Florida State, Michigan State, Oregon, and (surprise) Western Kentucky.
-Miami Ohio and New Mexico State remain winless.
In the NFL the only perfect ITS team – winless - is Minnesota.
Overwhelming
An update from our NFL Totals Tipsheet shows there have been 65 ‘OVERS’ and 54 ‘UNDERS’ this season in the NFL.
And once again leading the charge have been the totals results in non-conference games (AFC vs. NFC). These games have gone 27-11 OVER, including 3-0 OVER last week.
This week’s potential non-conference OVERS would be:
New Orleans at New York Jets
Tennessee at St. Louis
San Diego at Washington
Philadelphia at Oakland
Stat of the Week
The Kansas City Chiefs are 1-13 SU against teams hailing from the AFC East, including 0-9 ATS the last nine games.