Iowa State
vs.
TCU
College Football Pick
9/17/16
It’s been a rough start to the season for the Big 12, at least for most of the conference, including these two teams. Iowa State was hoping for improvement under new head coach Matt Campbell, but that hasn’t been the case, while TCU hasn’t done much to ease fan’s nerves. But on the road, the Horned Frogs opened as a -24 point favorite, as seen at 5 Dimes Sportsbook.
That spread also happens to be the same amount of points TCU won by in this meeting last year, 45-21. But to say nothing has changed for these teams would be an understatement. Both look vastly different on the offensive end, at least personnel wise.
The Horned Frogs can still Scorea bunch with Kenny Hill at quarterback, but he’s no Trevone Boykin and it appears their defense has taken a step back. As for Iowa State, they are bad on both sides of the field. again, nothing new.
TCU won this matchup last season with 436 passing yards, 74 rushing yards and five total touchdowns from Boykin. As for the Cyclones, they actually moved the ball fine, throwing for 346 yards and rushing for 115, but most of that came early as they didn’t Scoreafter the first quarter.
ISU hasn’t done much offensively yet with Joel LAnning at quarterback, scoring just 23 points total, namely losing 25-20 to Northern Iowa in the opener. Matt Campbell wants to run the ball more, but when your top RB has 19 carries for 58 yards on the season and the team is averaging 3.0 yards per carry, that’s not going to cut it. But maybe a matchup with TCU could change that.
Mike Warren looked good as a freshman, rushing for 1,339 yards, but he has found zero holes for Iowa State in the early Games. It’s likely they’ll still try and use the ground Game early against TCU, but if that doesn’t work, LAnning will have to air it out to Allen LAzard as much as possible. That’s just how you have to play against TCU. ISU could be down by two or three touchdowns in the first quarter if they try and run the ball without success to start the Game.
And Iowa State’s defense hasn’t been much better than TCU’s, considering they are coming off a 42-3 drubbing by rival Iowa. The Cyclones only lost that Game 31-17 last season.
Another 40-point outing should be in store for TCU, if not more. If C.J. Beathard had no trouble against this defense, then Kenny Hill will do just fine whether that’s on the ground or through the air. It wouldn’t be surprising if TCU tried to get the running Game going a little more as well, at least outside of Hill. Kyle Hicks has been solid in the first two Games with Four touchdowns and being a factor in the passing Game, but he hasn’t surpassed 59 yards on the ground yet.
Covering this Game will come down to scoring for Iowa State, and so far, no offense has had trouble scoring on the Horned Frogs. But looking at ISU’s recent results on the road, they haven’t been good. In addition the recent beat down by Iowa, the Cyclones fell by double digits in all but one road Game last season in Conference play. They also lost at Toledo in non-conference.
Given their defensive issues, TCU is hard to trust, but if they can Score50 points, that’ll require Iowa State to Scorealmost 30 themselves, which may be out of the cards. Iowa State/TCU OVER 61