Don't Be Fooled Early in the
College Football Season

The start of the new college football season always creates plenty of excitement, both for the rabid fan and the eager handicapper. But the infant campaign also has lots of uncertainty.

Unlike the NFL, with its four- or five-game preseason schedule, there are no preseason games in college football. Colleges start playing games that count from the get-go. Thus, it's the task of the handicapper to accumulate all of the information he can on each team, to get an estimation "on paper" of its strengths and weaknesses, and to project how those strengths and weaknesses will come into play in early-season matchups.

For those who enjoy games (both the game of football and the inner game of trying to predict the results), the exercise can be fun, fascinating, and exciting, but also sometimes disheartening and discouraging.

One of the first rules of thumb in early-season wagering is, don't go overboard. Admit it. As a handicapper, you really don't know all you would like to know about the players and teams. History has shown that in each season, each team tends to take on an identity all its own that might not be closely related to the previous season (when early injuries retarded progress, or an easy schedule helped build momentum, or when senior leaders became discouraged or frustrated, and so on). You're probably going to learn more about the current year's teams in their first two games than at any other similar period of the season.

It's also often the case that the lines posted on the games early in the season have more to do with how a team performed last year than how it might do this year. Take the 2000 Alabama team, for example. The Crimson Tide were coming off a fine 10-3 1999 season in which they defeated Florida 34-7 in the SEC title game and then suffered an excruciating 35-34 overtime loss to Big Ten power Michigan in the Orange Bowl. With an expected 17 starters returning, Alabama was listed as a 6.5-point favorite over UCLA in its 2000 season opener in the Rose Bowl.

But a funny thing happened to the Red Elephants on their highly anticipated run toward the peak of the polls. The Tide got hit by some key injuries and ineligibilities in fall camp, were dazzled by "Tinsel Town" and lost that opener 35-24 to the Bruins, and then found themselves dogged by inconsistency and disappointment, and by rumors swirling around coach Mike DuBose all season in a campaign that ended 3-8 (with a mortifying 9-0 loss to arch rival Auburn, to boot). The looking-great-on-paper idea didn't turn out too well on the field.

There are dozens of such stories on college campuses around the country each season. That being said, here are some pointspread categories that have turned out to be real foolers for handicappers in recent years.

Road favorites have gone 22-9 vs. the spread in the first full week of the college season over the last three years. That's not bad. The good teams have generally been able to go on the road that first week and carry a number. I think this is partly because the coaches on those teams have had an entire offseason to study, prepare, and put together a game plan for that opening-day opponent. And, as so often happens in the college game, once a superior visitor gets a weaker home team on the run, the hometown fans tend to get "bummed," and it's more difficult for the trailing team to come back.

But don't be fooled the next Saturday, as road favorites have gone only 14-25 vs. the spread in the second full week of the season over the last three years. This kind of difference (that is, 22-9 vs. 14-25) can be reflective of several factors. There's less preparation time for the favorites in their second game. Many underdog opponents might have suffered the bitter taste of defeat in their openers. And, of course, there's the "recency effect," in which the oddsmakers jack up the pointspread slightly for teams that looked good in their openers, and lower the pointspread slightly for teams that might have looked bad.

Small home favorites of 1 to 3 points are only 5-10 vs. the spread during the first two weeks of the college season over the last three years. It's usually the case that if a college team is favored by only three points or fewer at home, its opponent is considered to have better material. That's because for many college teams, the home-field advantage is usually worth 4 to 6 points. This pointspread range of 1 to 3 points has not been a good one for home favorites.

On the other hand, small road favorites of 1 to 3 points have held their own, going 7-4 vs. the spread during the opening two weeks of the season the last three years.

The best category for the home favorites has been the midrange area of 3.5 to 10 points, in which they're 24-15 the last three seasons. This is the area in which a home team judged to have slightly superior talent has often been able to bring its home-field edges to bear. In such games, big plays, uplifting fans, sudden changes in momentum, or a strong closing quarter might be just enough for the favorite to earn the cover.

Early-season big favorites of more than 28 points are only 17-23 vs. the spread in the first two weeks the last three seasons. It has not been a percentage play to lay the heavy lumber early in the year, despite the apparent big discrepancy in talent on the field. If you hope to beat the oddsmaker by playing big favorites early, you'd better choose your spots wisely.

Overall in the early season, it's best to bridle your enthusiasm to a large extent. It's a long season – longer than ever these days. Keep the overall picture in mind. Exercise proper money management while you're still learning about the teams, perhaps holding your wagers down to no more than 2 percent to 4 percent of your bankroll on any one game. Keep plenty in reserve for the next few weeks, when you'll know more about each team's new players, its leaders, its flaws, and its strengths in 2001.

Chuck Sippl is senior editor of the handicapping newsletter the Gold Sheet. For more insights and advice on sports betting, you can subscribe or pick one up at your local newsstand. The Gold Sheet focuses on team chemistry, insider reports, key statistics, pointspread trends, and its widely followed power ratings. If you haven't seen the Gold Sheet and would like to examine a complimentary sample copy with no obligation, call (800) 798-GOLD (4653) and say that you read about it in Card Player. You can look up the Gold Sheet on the web at www.goldsheet.com.