Line Items: Will Nebraska bounce back from a bad one and B1G picks for the rest of Week 6
How rough was the Huskers' loss to Michigan? It was biggest-margin-for-a-17-point-home-underdog-this-season rough.
With some time to process Nebraska’s 45-7 loss to Michigan it’s clear now that it was as bad as it looked in real time. The Huskers were 17-point home underdogs, which is rare—there have only been five home underdogs of 17 or 17.5 points so far this season. There were only 22 home dogs in that (admittedly narrow) range last season in FBS and FCS football combined.
Even more rare? The 38-point margin. It’s the largest for a home 17/17.5-point underdog, and the second-largest since the start of the 2022 season. Georgia Tech takes top dishonors, losing 42-0 to Mississippi as a 17.5-point underdog last year.1
Head coach Matt Rhule said it can’t happen again, which needs to be true. It’s already true that it rarely happens—to the magnitude it did last week anyway—in the first place.
But that’s old stuff.
This week, Nebraska (2-3, 0-2) heads to Illinois (2-3, 0-2) as a 3.5-point underdog. That’s basically the difference of home-field advantage meaning we’re looking at would should be a coin-flip game Friday. The winner is probably still alive in the woebegone-looking West with six games remaining. The loser probably isn’t.
The market is pretty much in line with what many power rankings would project here. Assuming a 2.5-point home-field advantage, FPI would make Illinois a 4-point favorite, SP+ a 4.5-point favorite and the Prediction Tracker Average, which includes more than 50 statistical models, is right at 4 points as well.
If I hadn’t committed to making a pick on every Big Ten game, I wouldn’t touch this game. Do I think Nebraska can win? Yes. Do I think Illinois can win? Yes.
I do think Nebraska’s strength on offense—an extreme commitment to running the ball for four quarters—aligns more closely with one of Illinois’ weaknesses than the Illini’s strength on offense—a strong success rate with a lack of explosiveness—aligns with any Husker weakness defensively. Nebraska is about average in defensive success rate after five games, but it has shown the ability to keep opponents behind the chains at times this season. Illinois also isn’t strong on third down so far, converting 32.2% to rank 119th, which has been an issue for Nebraska defensively (42.7%, 97th) at times.
For those reasons, I’ll take the Huskers +3.5. If it were +2.5, I’d probably go the other way. Whichever team wins on Friday is going to have to grind it out. I like Nebraska (first-year coach, likely a hope that the best is still yet to come) to do that more than Illinois (last year’s West darlings now confronted with a worse-than-expected start).
Read my full breakdown of the game below, then on to the picks for the rest of the Big Ten this week.
The Conference of Broad Shoulders
Season Record: 25-20-3 (.552)
Another narrow loss last week and the universe is restoring balance. We saw the complete range of against-the-spread outcomes in the Big Ten. Iowa (loss for me) and Penn State (win) were both within one point of the number. Minnesota (push) was exactly on it in an 11-point win over Louisiana. Maryland (win), Purdue (loss) and Michigan (loss) all obliterated the line. Let’s do it all again, shall we?
Maryland at Ohio State -19.5 (Prediction Tracker Average: OSU -15)
Ohio State is coming off a bye week, and the Buckeyes are 7-4 ATS under Ryan Day off a bye but just 5-5 with a rest advantage (which it has on Saturday). Maryland, 5-0 and outscoring opponents by 25 points per game, faces its first big test of the season. The teams are about equal in offensive success rate, but the Buckeyes are slightly more explosive. Defensively, Ohio State has the edge in efficiency but the gap narrows in the preventing-big-plays department. That could be reason enough to take the Buckeyes, but most of the power rankings would have this line 3 or 4 points lower. Turtle Power! Pick: Maryland +19.5
Rutgers at Wisconsin -14 (PTA: Wisconsin -10)
This sneakily might be the most telling game on the Big Ten slate this weekend. Rutgers can do some things. It’s not the most efficient on offense, but it hits for big plays at above the league average. Defensively it’s outpacing Wisconsin in both efficiency and explosiveness. The Badgers have a higher ceiling, and are still the favorite in the West because of that, but they’ve been all over the place this season. Both teams were off last week, it’s just that the Scarlet Knights played Wagner while Wisconsin was actually idle. I think the play here is on Rutgers, though I won’t be surprised if these two slug it out for three quarters, “Jump Around” plays and the Badgers end up with a 16-point win. Pick: Rutgers +14
Purdue at Iowa -2.5 (PTA: Iowa -7.5)
The power rankings collected at thepredictiontracker.com don’t know yet that Iowa quarterback Cade McNamara is out for the season, hence the 5-point gap in the line and the average prediction. Be nice if it were Iowa -7.5 because then the pick, Purdue, would be easy. It’s tougher at -2.5. The Hawkeye offense wasn’t rocketing up the charts with McNamara behind center, but it didn’t get better with backup Deacon Hill steering the ship most of the game last week. Purdue (2-3, 1-2) has already played four Power 5 opponents and it’s one Group of 5 game was against Fresno State, ranked 24th in this week’s AP poll. I’m slightly worried about Iowa’s ability to just pull a punt return or pick-six from its hat when needed, but Purdue has proven more at this point, underperforming the spread by -0.6 in 2023 compared with -5 for Iowa. Pick: Purdue +2.5
Michigan -19.5 at Minnesota (PTA: Michigan -17.5)
I would like to submit this line as evidence that Nebraska and Minnesota are basically the same right now.2 The Huskers were +17 at home against Michigan last week. This week, Minnesota is +19.5, a line that takes into account how the Wolverines handled Nebraska. In a typical year the Gophers are a team that gets better as the season goes along, but in their last three games they’ve been smoked by North Carolina, melted down against Northwestern and got pushed hard by Louisiana. Meanwhile, last week’s Nebraska game was evidence that Michigan may just have been in cruise control while failing to cover the first three weeks against massive underdogs. Minnesota could play well and Michigan might still cover. The reverse doesn’t seem to be true. Pick: Michigan -19.5
No line yet as it’s an FCS-FBS matchup, but Northwestern gets to beat up on Howard this week.
Jeff Sims was 18-for-32 passing for 161 yards in that game, if you’re curious.
If the actual score between the teams when they played didn’t already indicate that.