College Football Betting: Louisiana Tech at Western Kentucky

One Thursday night football game on the board as most eyes will be on the NFL opening night event. College fans will be treated to an entertaining matchup between Louisiana Tech and Western Kentucky. Both teams started the season with a win last week though against a measurably different level of competition. Louisiana Tech played a glorified scrimmage against Southern University winning 62-15 and covering the spread as -39 point favorites. The game was over by halftime–Louisiana Tech quarterback Jeff Driskel led his team on eight first half scoring drives and gave the Ragin’ Cajuns a 52-8 lead at the break. Western Kentucky, meanwhile, won a hard fought game against SEC bottom feeder Vanderbilt. The Hilltoppers beat the Commodores 14-12 and although the win was perceived as a ‘mild upset’ by the clueless mainstream sports media the reality was that Western Kentucky had entered as a -2 favorite and pushed against the pointspread.

So how good is Louisiana Tech and–more significantly perhaps–how good is Florida transfer quarterback Jeff Driskel? Let’s start with Driskell–he’s good but not to the extent that we saw last week against a doormat. He’s not going to be good for eight scoring drives per half and particularly now that he’s stepping up in class. He should benefit greatly from being in a more open offensive scheme and Skip Holtz will gladly let him throw the ball all over the yard. Western Kentucky is sky high for this game and to some extent that might have accounted for the lackluster showing against Vanderbilt. They’ve got their own first rate quarterback in Brandon Doughty who had one of the worst games of his career in last year’s meeting throwing four interceptions.

Ultimately, this is a decent matchup but one we see going the favorite’s way. And given what is a strong overemphasis on the revenge component in the marketplace we’ll back Louisiana Tech. Skip Holtz has been money in the bank at the betting window and is currently on a 12-3 ATS run. Our numbers have LaTech winning by a touchdown or so which won’t make this one a blowout but will cover the number.

BET LOUISIANA TECH -1′ OVER WESTERN KENTUCKY