Ohio State
vs.
Maryland
College Football Pick
11/12/16
Football is a funny thing. Ohio State looked mediocre for a stretch of three Games, but randomly decided to turn things up against Nebraska last weekend. If that same team shows up here, it’ll be close to impossible for Maryland to cover, who is coming off a beat down of its own. The Buckeyes were -27.5 point road favorites early in the week as seen at 5 Dimes Sportsbook.
The Buckeyes started the season on fire, running through everyone including Oklahoma. And then the Wisconsin Game happened and their flaws were shown. They beat the Badgers, but lost at Penn State the next week and then had trouble disposing of Northwestern after that. But the Cornhuskers were no match last weekend in a 62-3 win.
Maryland has had its moments this season, but they’ve mostly been few and far between. They started hot in non-Conference play and then dominated Purdue in the Big Ten opener, but it’s been mostly downhill from there. The Terrapins lost by 21 points at home to Minnesota and now are coming off a 59-3 loss at Michigan.
The thought is that Ohio State can do the same thing to the Terps that the Wolverines did. There’s no reason to believe otherwise, considering Maryland already has a bad Minnesota loss at home.
In this matchup last year, the Terps actually stuck around in a 49-28 loss, although they were helped by a 75-yard run by Perry Hills. That said, Maryland still ran for 253 yards as a team in that Game.
However, the problem for the Terps in this one is that Hills was knocked out of their last Game against Michigan after taking a late shot to the ribs. If he can’t go, the money would likely continue to pile up on the Buckeyes in this Game because the Maryland offense has often looked inept without Hills at quarterback.
Caleb Rowe replaced Hills against the Wolverines and he managed 203 yards and a couple picks in his first action of the season. It’s hard to put too much into those numbers because of the situation he was thrown into. Without Hills, scoring may be hard to come by for the Terps in this Game once again. Lorenzo Harrison and Ty Johnson have been decent at picking up chunks of yardage on the ground, but it’s hard to see that being enough against the Bucks.
Ohio State’s struggles from last month stemmed from a weaker offensive line and that in turn hurt J.T. Barrett’s ability to do much of anything. They figured some of that out last Game and the Terps don’t exactly have a great defensive line as it is.
After throwing for Four touchdowns (as many as the previous Four Games combined) against the Huskers, Barrett could be in for another nice Game against this defense that was just torched by the Wolverines. Mike Weber should have plenty of room to run, while Curtis Samuel will likely pad has stats as well in both the rushing and receiving Game.
The Terps are allowing 27.2 points per Game, but just gave up 59 to Michigan and 42 to Indiana before that. Stopping the Buckeyes will be equally as difficult.
The Buckeyes are 1-4 ATS in their last five overall (with the cover being last week) and 4-1 ATS in their last five following an ATS win. The Terrapins are 1-4 ATS in their last five as well, but 13-6 ATS in their last 19 following a straight-up loss.
Our Pick – Ohio State -28