College Football Week 5 Predictions: South Carolina and TCU Among Best Bets
Last Saturday, we learned that Colorado is not going to play for a national championship this season, and we were treated to an exciting finish between Ohio State and Notre Dame. This weekend, we have another great slate of action, with a number of top-ranked teams facing strong competition.
#10 Utah and #19 Oregon State will meet on Friday night to get things started, followed by a matchup between #24 Kansas and #3 Texas on Saturday afternoon at 3:30 pm ET. #13 LSU and #20 Ole Miss play each other, as does #11 Notre Dame and #17 Duke. It should be an action-packed weekend of college football once again!
Each week this season, we will be taking an early look at betting lines, offering a few leans for the community to consider tailing before odds move!
#8 USC vs. Colorado, Over 73.5
In Week 4, everyone expected a shootout for the ages between Oregon and Colorado, but Colorado’s porous offensive line never allowed Shedeur Sanders and company to show up to the party. This weekend, Sanders and the Colorado offense should have much more room to operate against a USC defense that is far less talented than Oregon. In USC’s one road contest this season, the game totaled 70 points against Arizona State. Expect Colorado to have a bounce-back performance offensively, which should help the over here.
#9 Oregon vs. Stanford (+27)
Coming from a huge analytics guy, there is some truth to emotional letdown spots, and this is a huge emotional letdown spot for Oregon. Last week, head coach Dan Lanning had his team foaming at the mouth, ready to put an end to the Colorado hype train. There is simply no way that Oregon will be able to gather enough emotional energy, on the road, to take this contest against Stanford overly seriously. Stanford was blown out by USC, but that contest was on the road. The Cardinals have either won outright or lost by one score in their other three games to begin the year. Covering four touchdowns at home is a reasonable ask in this spot.
#11 Notre Dame (-5.5) vs. #17 Duke
Sam Hartman struggles mightily under pressure, which made his matchup with Ohio State so difficult last weekend. In Week 5, Notre Dame will play Duke, which has a much more mediocre pass rush. Hartman should thrive in this matchup, which should propel the Fighting Irish offense to enough points to win a shootout against a Duke team that has likely overachieved to date this fall.
South Carolina (+12.5) vs. #21 Tennessee
Tennessee has covered this spread against Virginia and UTSA so far in 2023, but they lost by 13 to Florida and only defeated Austin Peay by 17 points. South Carolina lost by only 14 points to North Carolina, 10 points to Georgia and beat Mississippi State by seven points. Led by talented quarterback Spencer Rattler, South Carolina is not a team that is easily blown out, especially not by a team like Tennessee that has struggled to put points on the board at times this season.
West Virginia vs. TCU (-11)
In West Virginia’s only road contest so far in 2023, they scored 15 points in a 23-point loss to Penn State. In two of their other games played, they have scored 20 points or less against Pittsburgh and Texas Tech. TCU is a flawed football team, but they have yet to score fewer than 34 points this season, and each of their last three wins have come by at least 17 points. Playing at home against an offensively-challenged opponent, TCU should be able to cover this spread and then some.