The start of the 2017 College Football season is a bit different this year. Instead of starting the Thursday before Labor Day weekend. This year the season will start the weekend before Labor Day with a four game slate. CollegeFootballGamePicker.com will get things rolling by giving a premium pick and prediction for all 4 August 26th games to start off 2017. The Premium Picks will be free this weekend since it is a very small opening weekend. This will give the Non Subscription Members a chance to checkout the Premium Picks for the first weekend before the main slate kicks off next Thursday.
The team highlighted in green is the team predicted to cover the Vegas spread listed. The picks and Vegas spreads will generally be locked down Friday at 5PM to get a better gauge on the percentage correct each week. The game picker will be used in tandem with the intangibles to generate green picks each week. Weather will be added within a day or two of gameday for each game.
Premium Picks:
Saturday (August 26th) – Oregon St vs Colorado St
(Vegas Colorado St -4 ) (Game Picker Colorado St by 2.731 )
This should be a pretty good matchup between the Mountain West Colorado St Rams and the PAC-12 Oregon State Beavers. There are no real mismatches with these two teams as each will have a fairly decent running game and a lack luster defense. Oregon St has a 6-7 junior college transfer QB Jake Lutton and starting wide receivers that are 6’4″ and 6’5″ along with a veteran running back in Ryan Hall. All of the Colorado State starting DBs are 5’10” and 5’11”. Colorado St will put points on the board, but this will be a close game, with the Beavers maybe coming out with the win if their defense can be as good as HC Gary Anderson thinks they will be.
Hawaii vs UMass
(Vegas UMass -3 ) (Game Picker Hawaii by 2.333 )
Hawaii returns a good portion of its starting Offense that went bowling last year. Hawaii Starting QB Dru Brown will be the difference in this one. Brown should be able to put points on the board against UMass who allowed 35.5 points and 452.7 yards per game last year. UMass will actually get to play their home games in Amherst instead of having to drive 100 miles to Gillette Stadium. My guess is the Vegas line is in UMass favor because of the excitement over the home game. Hawaii should be able to score enough to cover in this one.
South Florida vs San Jose State
(Vegas South Florida -21.5 ) (Game Picker South Florida by 21.25 )
Former Texas Coach Charlie Strong takes over at South Florida with 16 returning starters including standout QB Quinton Flowers ( a poor man’s Lamar Jackson). South Florida won 11 games last year and should be favored in every game they play this year. San Jose St does not return a starting QB, RB, or WR. This spread would be much higher if it were not being played at San Jose St. Look for the veteran QB for the South Florida Bulls to take control of this one early and cover the spread.
Rice vs Stanford
(Vegas Stanford -30.0 ) (Game Picker Stanford by 36.66 )
This is a major mismatch and Stanford should be able to roll over Rice and score as many points as they choose to. Stanford returns 16 starters including QB Keller Chryst. I look for Stanford to leave the starters in late into the game as they have a week off before playing one of their biggest games of the year against USC on September 9th. They will want to get a good look at their starters and will try to find chemistry against an undermanned Rice team. This game is being played in a neutral setting (Australia) or the line would be much higher.
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Vegas Lines for the August 26th Games
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