We must say that it used to be much more fashionable for coaches to run up scores in college football, however gratuitously. The national championship was decided by the polls only, meaning by a vote of sportswriters and college football coaches – which of course meant, for the most part, their sports information directors (S.I.D.’s), who generally are guys who couldn’t get real gigs as sportswriters.
College Football Betting Strategies – Does Running Up The Score Help in the Polls?
Running up the score worked really well because these voters weren’t paying a whole lot of attention to how good the opponents were, how meaningful the points were within the context of a game, and how much came after the other team stopped playing. They were just overly impressed with blowouts and underwhelmed when a team they thought should win by 40 won by 17.
This bred the behavior of the Tom Osbornes, the Steve Spurriers. the Bill Snyders, the Bobby Bowdens, which bordered on the outrageous at times. VietBet customers might remember the time when Snyder, whose Kansas State team was up by 50 points approaching halftime, called a timeout just before the gun to kick a meaningless field goal, so he could win the game by three more points. That, of course, made them more attractive to college football bettors as a favorite, although it is interesting how at least a couple of those guys later wound up on the other end of those blowouts.
College Football Betting Strategies – BCS Rankings Effect on Betting
This was all before the BCS ratings came along, which, at least to some extent, mitigated the effect of this kind of thing. Sharper college football bettors have long understood that teams who specialized in blowouts and looked like monsters on paper, could be brought down to earth by those programs who didn’t necessarily care about that kind of thing. Some of that started when Miami beat Nebraska for the national title in the Orange Bowl in 1984. Nebraska has beaten so many teams by huge margins that they were considered one of the most fearsome teams of all time. Miami’s Howard Schnellenberger really wasn’t known as a type who would run up the score, and it created the perception among writers that the Orange Bowl game wouldn’t be a contest. But of course, as we know, Miami scored the straight-up win for its first national title, and the rest is history.
There is still a human element in the process of the selection of the four teams for the college football playoff because the polls factor into it. But because of the computer formula that takes into account the strength of schedule and creates a point of diminishing returns for coaches who run up the score, there is less of a need for schools in the bigger conferences to do that (of course, teams like Boise State, from a non-BCS conference, are going to be an exception).
NCAA Football Betting Strategies – Beware the Cover
Still, you will see it, and college football bettors need to take note. We recall, not that long ago, when Oklahoma, vying for a national title but a spot in the Big 12 title game first, scored 58 points or more against six straight opponents as a way of impressing everyone, including the media. A lot of this was gratuitous, but it still gave them an aura as an awesome force. And as a side benefit, it reinforced the Heisman candidacy of Sam Bradford. Each of those last six games were covers, and the linemaker couldn’t set the number high enough. If you didn’t recognize the motivation there, then you don’t belong in the world of college football betting.
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By Charles Jay
