Notre Dame vs. Texas Prediction
Will No. 10 Notre Dame and Texas find themselves in a shootout when they meet up tonight at 7:30PM ET on ABC?
According to oddsmakers at BetDSI, Notre Dame is the slight favorite on the road, as the Fighting Irish are getting odds of -3.5 points against the Longhorns. The over/under total for the contest has been set at 58 points. These two met last season with Notre Dame picking up a 38-3 victory.
Notre Dame is coming off a 10-3 record in 2015 where it battled a number of injuries and still had a great year. The Irish had their three losses come against Clemson, Stanford and Ohio State, two of which were by just 2 points each. The Irish were pretty steady with their scoring, hitting the over in 7 of 13 games while averaging 34.2 points per game. The Irish plan to play both DeShone Kizer and Malik Zaire at QB in the opener. Kizer played most of last season when Zaire was hurt. Both quarterbacks have dual-threat potential and shouldn’t have much trouble leading this offense. Along with them, Josh Adams is in the backfield coming off 835 rushing yards as a freshman. Defensively, the Irish gave up 362 yards and 22.4 points per game in 2015 with a very competitive schedule.
Texas is coming off a 5-7 record in 2015 that saw the Longhorns have a lot of ups and downs. Wins over the likes of Baylor and Oklahoma give the Longhorns some optimism about this season, but this is still a team that lost 38-3 to Notre Dame, 50-7 to TCU and 24-0 to Iowa State. The Longhorns were 7-5 with the under last season, more due to their lack of scoring. Texas gave up 453 yards and 30.3 points per game on defense while posting only 26.4 points and 371 yards per game on offense. Like ND, Texas has QB questions as Shane Buechele and Tyrone Swoopes are battling for the job. Swoopes has some experience from last season, throwing for 537 yards and four touchdowns. He also played in 2014, throwing for 2,409 yards and 13 scores. D’Onta Foreman is a capable back that averaged 7.2 yards per carry last season, but he comes into tonight questionable with a hamstring injury.
NCAA FB QUICK LINKS: Scores & Matchups | Injuries | Odds Comparison | Betting Trends | ATS Stats | Standings
Texas is being given a lot of hype for a team that really struggled last season. The Longhorns seem to be living off their program’s history right now as opposed to recent results. Notre Dame is dealing with some potential suspensions for this game, but the Irish should still have enough to deal with Texas. However, the suspensions are likely to lead to an ugly football game. Don’t look for Texas to have it all figured out on offense tonight while the Irish may struggle to find a flow with two quarterbacks being used.
COLLEGE FOOTBALL WEEK 1 PREDICTION: NOTRE DAME/TEXAS UNDER 58