It could be an offensive year in Ivy League

NCAA Football Betting Lines

08/10/2010 - Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - To new Princeton head football coach Bob Surace, the golden words that James Perry used this past winter in describing his philosophy while he interviewed for the position of offensive coordinator were "fast and physical."

Surace and Cornell's Kent Austin, who also is debuting as an Ivy League coach, might want to strap on their seatbelts. This could be a season for the offenses in the Ivy League.

The three teams that finished 1-2-3 in scoring within Ivy League play last season were ranked in that order today in the league's preseason media poll, with Harvard first, defending champion Penn second and Brown third. Each has key returning offensive players, but the offensive talent is vast across the league.

In the reverse of a year ago, six of the league's eight teams return their top quarterback. Also, the top five rushers are back this season.

Meanwhile, 14 players made an expanded All-Ivy first-team defense last year, and only Harvard safety Colin Zych and Yale cornerback Adam Money are back this season.

Surace returns to Princeton 21 years after being the senior center on an Ivy League championship squad. The 42-year-old spent two seasons as the head coach at Western Connecticut State and was an offensive assistant with the Cincinnati Bengals.

Austin, 47, never played or coached in the Ivy League, spending 15 seasons in the CFL and the last two as offensive coordinator at Ole Miss.

Their offensive backgrounds fit in well with what could be an intriguing race. Their coaching brethren were happy to fill them in on the rest of what to expect out of the Ivy League's style of play.

"It's almost an awakening that there's some great coaches here that do a lot," Brown's Phil Estes said. "Sometimes you get at big-time schools and you can basically be very basic in your offense and defense and be able to win. I think in the Ivy League you have coaches that really do their homework. They need to be prepared for each and every week for something different and something new and some kind of new wrinkle that's gonna go in. These guys know it, though.

"It used to be you could look at the schedule and kind of pinpoint different games that you think might be a 'W'. I don't think you can do that in the Ivy League. From top to bottom, it's going to be a tough game each and every game."

"People seem to be going wholesale to spreading you out and trying to make you cover the whole field," Columbia's Norries Wilson said. "The issue I see with that is you spend so much time trying to figure out ways to spread people out and sometimes you forget those guys on defense get paid to coach as well. So someone tinkers with something and you spend a lot of time doing it. But the spread-out game kind of makes it a little bit like basketball on the turf there."

Added Harvard's Tim Murphy, "I think it's going to very versatile, very multiple, a lot of different things. To some extent, I think that's consistent with most leagues.

"They're going to see a lot of different things."

The league's returning quarterbacks are led by Brown senior Kyle Newhall- Caballero, the first-team selection last season. Also back are Harvard's Collier Winters, Penn's Keiffer Garton, Yale's Patrick Witt, Princeton's Tommy Wornham and Dartmouth's Conner Kempe. Columbia will turn to sophomore Sean Brackett, while Austin has three candidates at Cornell, junior Adam Currie, sophomore Chris Amrhein and freshman Jeff Mathews.

Among running backs, Dartmouth workhorse Nick Schwieger could repeat as the Ivy rushing champion, though last year's No. 2 rusher, Brown's Zach Tronti, will be in the mix. Harvard's Gino Gordon and Treavor Scales, who were third and fourth, respectively, and Penn's Lyle Marsh, who was fifth, also are back this season.

Besides Zych and Money, some of the top defensive players trying to slow the offenses are Princeton linebacker Steven Cody and Brown cornerback A.J. Cruz.

IVY LEAGUE PRESEASON POLL (Media)

1. Harvard (10 first-place votes), 128 points

2. Penn (6), 124

3. Brown, 95

4. Yale (1), 83

5. Columbia, 61

6. Princeton, 55

7. Dartmouth, 39

8. Cornell, 27

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College Football Betting Tips From a Pro

While the NFL is the sport wagered on the heaviest, college football betting lines has become more and more popular as people realize it’s a game that can be beat. The NCAA football season gets longer each year with the addition of numerous bowl games and with that comes more opportunities for more money in your pocket, if handled correctly.

Betting on college football is not the same as with the NFL, so make sure you separate the two. Because of the vast number of teams, the parity between college football programs is slight and thus, you are going to see some high numbers in the NCAA. Teams favored by more than 40 points are not uncommon especially early in the season when teams playing their non-conference schedules.

The best advice when trying to tackle these enormous spreads and is to just stay away. A team that is favored by 40 points is favored by that many for a reason while teams getting 40 points are bad enough that they shouldn’t be touched. Set yourself a spread limit. Getting rid of these games will cut down on the number of contests that you need to handicap while staying away from backdoor or front-door covers.

What is a backdoor and front-door cover you ask? A backdoor cover is a team that is getting beat by more than the spread, but scores late to get within that number thus covering the spread. A front-door cover is just the opposite where the favorite scores late and covers the number they are favored by.

These front-door and backdoor covers are common when second and third string players enter games in college football and it can be the worst nightmare for some bettors. These players can also be your best friend, but ask any bettor and he will give you more instances on losing in this situation than winning. It just seems to work out that way even though everything evens out in the end.

College football betting has some of the softest lines of any sport and it’s being able to find these lines that will make you a successful college football handicapper. The NFL and NBA have the tightest lines around and while those sports can be beat by looking at situations and systems, college football doesn’t quite work that way. It’s much more manual, but when done correctly, it’s much more gratifying as well.

Getting into the nuts and bolts of college football means looking at the many stats in order to beat the number. As opposed to pro football, college football is less dependent on situations and angles and more on certain statistics. Rushing offense and defense, pass efficiency offense and defense and turnover margins are huge. These are vital in the NFL, but even more so when it comes to college football.

Being able to run the ball in college football has always been a key factor in the overall success of a team. The same adage also goes for teams who have the ability to stop the run. Putting these two factors together can produce some positive results in a team’s record both straight up and against the spread. These numbers show huge differences in teams and the spread may not take those into effect, which is where the value comes into play.

Passing yardage numbers both for and against can be a misinterpreted statistic. However, pass efficiency has always been one of the best ways to look at a teams’ passing game ability both offensively and defensively. But is it really a true indication of how they perform? I wouldn’t say so since they are raw passing numbers with nothing else taken into consideration.

I use pass efficiency ratings when doing my handicapping but I adjust my numbers based on a number of factors including power ratings, strength of schedules, personnel and injuries. This gives a much better picture of a team’s ability to pass effectively and also being able to defend the pass. Tweaking pass efficiency stats instead of raw passing yards is the key.

Turnovers are the single most frustrating, and at times the most gratifying, aspect of a college football lines, mostly because they are so unpredictable. They are part of the game and most of the time nothing can be done to control them. However, turnovers are contagious and they can carry over from game to game and season to season.

It’s important to know how to forecast these unforeseen events and how to use them to your advantage. You can find ways to give yourself an edge by looking at past histories of teams and coaches and how they have fared in turnover wars in the past. Instead of turnovers hurting you at the wrong times, find ways to use them to your advantage.

As you can see, college football handicapping is very labor intensive and isn’t just based on where teams are ranked in the AP and coaches polls. Experience, coaching and match-ups are all important since unlike the NFL, college teams turn over much more often with new personnel at most positions every single year. Keeping current on this information is vital.

Betting NCAA football can be lucrative if done correctly, but more importantly, it’s just plain enjoyable because it can be beat. College football is one of the best sports to watch with some of the best rivalries taking place in all of sports. The only downfall is that a championship isn’t decided on the field but on a computer-based system that is the Bowl Championship Series. That will change someday and we will all be better off for it.

To visit this online sportsbook got to MySportsbook.com for all your NCAA college football betting needs. Mysportsbook.com online sportsbook accepts Visa and Mastercard credit cards.