Baylor
at
West Virginia
College Football
Free Pick
10/25/18
West Virginia got an extra week to think about its loss to Iowa State and get ready for the gauntlet that is the final month of its season. Baylor isn’t part of that mix, but the Bears are still a quality team that almost took down Texas on the road in their last Game. The Mountaineers opened as hefty -14 point home favorites at 5Dimes Sportsbook.
These teams have had some tight Games the last couple years with West Virginia winning the last two by a combined five points. That’s reason enough to go with the underdog in this Game, though the Bears needed 23 unanswered Fourth-quarter points to make a Game of last year’s matchup. The defense had no answer for Will Grier as he threw for 375 yards and five touchdowns with three of those going to top wide out David Sills. Baylor struggled to get a ground Game going at just 3.0 yards per carry, but the biggest thing was that the offense moved the ball late when a more mobile Charlie Brewer took over at quarterback.
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Conveniently, Brewer is still Baylor’s quarterback and while his numbers aren’t overly great at 7.34 yards per attempt, he’s been able to put points on the board when needed, namely the 37-34 win against K State. WVU’s defense has good overall numbers, though a lot of that has to do with Schedule because the faults were shown against Iowa State, giving up 244 rushing yards. And that’s exactly where Baylor will try and attack with JaMycal Hasty and John Lovett. Even though neither of them is over 301 rushing yards for the year, both are averaging at least five yards per carry and that could be huge in this Game. Of course, if Baylor gets put in an early hole because of its defense, that may not be possible.
The Bears still have one of the weaker defenses in the Conference giving up more than 400 yards and 189 rushing yards per contest. It wouldn’t be surprising if the Mountaineers tried to attack that poor rush defense with Kennedy McKoy, Leddie Brown and Martell Pettaway, but then again they have Grier and he can Scoreon almost every defense. The problem against the Cyclones was that the offensive line got clobbered and Grier now has 19 rushes for -42 yards in the last two Games mostly due to sacks. If that continues to be an issue, the Mountaineers may not be beating anyone by 14 points, especially with the rest of their Schedule.
That said, Grier will still put plenty of points up against this defense, it’s whether you believe in the WVU defense enough to bet on them at home. There are still plenty of unknowns for West Virginia and those may be exploited in the next month. If Brewer and Baylor can move the chains, that may be enough to keep it competitive.
The Bears are 3-1-1 ATS in their last five road Games and the Mountaineers are 3-1-1 ATS vs. a team with a winning record. Baylor is 5-1 ATS in the last six meetings between these schools, though the home team is 4-1 ATS in the last five.
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