College Football - Week 5

College Football – Week 5

Week 4 Premium Play Record: 3-3 (even)

Week 4 Leans Record: 2-3 (-0.5 units)

2025 Premium Plays Record: 10-8 (+3 units)

2025 Leans Record: 6-7 (-0.5 units)

2025 Overall Combined Record: 16-15 (+2.5 units)

S-T-A-T-E of the Union: Broke even on the premium plays… Couple easy wins.. Couple complete misses. What a win for the Red Raiders who are now in the driver seat for a playoff birth coming out of the B12. My absolute boy, Mike Gundy, was let go by Ok State this week. What a run it was. With that, I will give my hotseat update following week 4: Napier – dead but I wish he wasn’t, Luke Fickel – dead just doesn’t know it yet, Sam Pittman – should be dead but what is Arkansas going to do about it, Dabo – very alive but I am absolutely loving what I’m seeing out of Clemson.

Week 5 Preview: Tossing some haymakers here. I think we might just catch Vegas with their pants around their ankles this week. Expecting to be playing with house money when I wake up Saturday morning. This one’s for you, Coach Gundy.

Week 5 Premium Plays:

Florida State -7 vs Virgina (3 units): Friday night game. This is a double your net worth type of play, however, we at Spo’s Sports believe in unit management and Tickets personally runs a 3 unit system so here we are. 3-unit max bet on the Florida State Seminoles Friday night in Charlottesville, VA for the Seminoles first conference tilt of the year. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry looks at this and wants to tell you it’s a trap game for the Seminoles. “Friday night game!”, “Look-a-head for FSU with Miami next week!”, “UVA is wearing retro jerseys!”, “UVA has an elite offense!”, “UVA has a chip on their shoulder!”…. the list goes on. Listen… Poindexter… this is a men amongst boys situation. There will be no upset. Florida State is going to put belt to ass for four quarters. The stat sheet isn’t going to tell you what you want to know about this Virginia Cavaliers team (reality is the same goes for Florida State), however, film study will tell you a couple things: 1. UVA secondary is a liability. 2. The teams UVA have played are all bottom 15% in FBS 3. UVA offensive line is lackluster especially with the potential absence of veteran center, Brady Wilson, among other injuries. I would be remised if I did not mention the only hope UVA has – Chandler Morris to senior WR Trell Harris, who has totaled 321 yards and 3TDs so far this season. In all seriousness, UVA defense is atrocious. Florida State is going to run the ball down their throat and then take the top off with a deep play. On the defensive side of the ball, the Tony White 3-3-5 defense is going to keep the ball in front of them and make the Cavaliers earn every point. This Florida State team seems to be laser focused and I expect a rout in Charlottesville confirming their legitimacy as a national title contender. Noles get out unscathed, 45 – 17.

Illinois +7 vs USC (3 units): Illinois bounces back here a week after getting the prison treatment from Curt Cignetti’s Indiana Hoosiers. We backed the Illini last week and I am on them again here. Stop me if you have heard this before… the number is too big. 7 points is just too many here and I trust Bret Bielema and Luke Altmyer to keep it between the number here after a wake up call a week ago. Turn the clocks back 3 hours for the Trojans as they will be kicking off at 10am pacific time. The impact of these long distance Big 10 conference road games have been well documented over the last two years and I certainly think that plays in our favor here. Altmyer is going to have to take care of the ball and the Illini are going to have to get RB duo Kaden Feagin and Ca’lil Valentine going on the ground. The thunder and lighting RB duo have combined for over 400 yards on the ground averaging 5 yards a clip. I expect this to be a low scoring affair with Illinois heading into the half with a lead. Key for Illinois is getting 7, not 3 on their redzone trips. Last but not least, I am not banking on this but I wouldn’t mind the 128^th ranked penalized team in the country in USC giving us a couple bail out penalties along the way. Illini get back on track, 24-20.

Boston College -6 vs Cal (2 units): Cannot get enough of these west coast teams heading across the country. Worked out for us in both picks with this factor a week ago. Toss in a true freshman QB with Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele who was seeing ghosts a week ago against a bad SDSU team and I am all ears. Cal isn’t necessarily a push over but they are coming off a 34-0 blowout at the hands of SDSU where the Golden Bears closed as a 14 point favorite. True freshman QB, Sagapolutele tossed two picks in the contest a week ago which is a blemish on an otherwise great start to his freshman campaign. On the other sideline, we have the Bill O’Brien led team fresh off a by who knows they are a play or two away from being 3-0. Former five star Bama transfer QB Dylan Lonergan is so ugly he hurts to look at, but he throws an unbelievable ball. The third year signal called has his squad ranked as the top passing offense in the country averaging 393 yards per game. The top ranked BC unit will be facing off against the 60^th ranked passing defense unit. Boston College doesn’t have the same luster on the defensive side of the ball but the stats are skewed by an overtime game against Michigan State and falling victim to the same trend we are following here with an 11PM kick in California in week 3 – inhumane. Icing on the cake here, Cal ranks 99^th in third down conversions from an offensive view point while Boston College ranks 34^th defensively in the same category. The Eagles also average 25 yards less than the Golden Bears in penalty yards per game. Keep an eye out for Lonergan to take the top off the Cal defense finding sophomore speedster WR Reed Harris streaking butt naked behind the secondary. Dylan Lonergan finds himself with Billy Tickets in his corner after taking care of business for us here. Eagles get on the board in conference play, 35-21.

Alabama at Georgia under 54.4 (1 unit): Massive game for both teams in a top 25 matchup. Bama opens SEC play on the road in Athens after taking care of business against Wisconsin and UL-Monroe. Meanwhile, Kirby is out to prove he doesn’t have an Alabama problem, only a Nick Saban problem. Kirby Smart can double his total wins against Alabama with a win on Saturday moving that total up to two. I think this number is inflated a little bit after the points put up the last couple weeks by both teams. Georgia managed to pad the stats two weeks ago against the 85^th ranked Tennessee Volunteers defense but run into a top 20 defensive unit this week. I’m also not going to let one game throw me off the scent of Gunnar Stockton or Ty Simpson. Both QBs have looked shaky and certainly do not have the full trust of the coaching staff to really allow either team open it up. This is a heated rivalry game with massive implications that I expect to start slow with both teams jockeying for field position. Bama will have stud running back Jam Miller back for his first action of the season which will give Bama OC Ryan Grubbs an added reason to keep the ball on the ground. Both Georgia and Alabama had an extra week to get ready for this game coming of their respective bye weeks which I think plays to the under in this situation giving the game a playoff game vibe. Georgia all but ends Alabama’s season, 24-14.

Baylor -20.5 at Oklahoma State (2 units): Michael Ray Gundy. Say his name. Fired – justly, midseason after 21 years. Pains me to profit off the firing of one of my absolute boys but we talked about this last week – fiduciary responsibility. Gundy was the heart and soul of Oklahoma State and single handedly dragged that program to relevancy. Most situations, when a coach is fired, you look to the interim head coach bump – not here. Gundy is gone and took with him any spark this team had. The Cowboys can’t throw (126^th ranked pass offense), they can’t score (134^th ranked scoring offense - out of 136), and they can’t play defense (119^th ranked defense). That is with the whole team playing… The injury report after Gundy’s exit is… extensive. 27 players on the ‘injury’ report aka transfer report for the Cowboys including an entire offensive unit – not kidding – 5 OL, 2 TE, 1 QB, 2 WRs, and a RB. It is bad and getting worse in Stillwater. Baylor comes to town and is a solid team beating a ranked SMU and playing Auburn and Arizona State close. They can score points although they may only need to get to 21 to cover here. I’ve seen enough from the Bears. Blowout in Stillwater, 41-10.  

Week 5 Leans:

Virginia Tech +10.5 at NC State: 10.5 far too many – coaching change or not

Houston -13.5 at Oregon State: Would be a premium play if I had not hitched my wagon to this travel distance narrative. Houston has covered 13.5 in all three games so far and Oregon State has only stayed within this number once this year against Fresno State where they lost by 9. Should be a dog walk.

UCF +6.5 at Kansas State: Another one that would be a premium play if it weren’t for Kansas State coming off a bye. Potential last gasp for air by the Wildcats. Solid UCF team against an atrocious KState team.

Kansas -4.5 vs Cincinnati: Jalon Daniels drinking from the fountain of youth in year six looking sharp as ever for the Jayhawks.

Oregon +3.5 at Penn State: Not buying Drew Allar and the Penn State offense whatsoever. I’ll take the opportunity to fade James Franklin in a big spot.

Known charitable organization, Las Vegas, doing some pro-bono work here this week. Might as well take advantage.

Sincerely,

William Tickets