East Carolina at Houston Line

Written by Steve Janus

The Houston Cougars are set to host the East Carolina Pirates in a Conference USA matchup on Saturday. Houston outscored UTEP 49-42 last Thursday to improve to 5-0. It was the third win this season by a touchdown or less. East Carolina is just 1-3 after falling 20-35 at home to North Carolina. The Pirates only victory this season is a 28-23 win over UAB.

Taking a look at the week 6 college football lines, oddsmakers currently have the Cougars favored by 9.5-points over the Pirates with the total set at 73 points.

East Carolina Pirates:

The Pirates have played an extremely difficult schedule to start the season. Their three losses have came against the likes of South Carolina, Virginia Tech, and UNC. This will be another difficult game for East Carolina, but one they could win.

East Carolina has the 8th ranked passing attack in the country, averaging 318.7 yards per game. Dominique Davis has played every snap at quarterback for the Pirates, completing 68.6% of his passes with nine touchdowns. The only knock on Davis has been his seven interceptions. Davis better take care of the football this week, as you can’t afford to give the Cougars easy opportunities to score.

The two big threats on the outside are senior Lance Lewis and redshirt freshman Justin Hardy. Lewis leads the team with 34 receptions for 360 yards and five scores, while Hardy has hauled in 31 passes for 285 yards and two touchdowns.

Junior running back Reggie Bullock leads the way with 318 yards on the ground, but 169 of those yards came against UAB. Bullock should have a chance for a big game against a Houston defense that is allowing 192.4 rushing yards on average.

Houston Cougars:

The Cougars recipe for success is no secret. Score more points than their defense gives up. Houston leads the nation in passing (451.2 ypg) and total offense (610 ypg). Outside of a shutout against Georgia State, the Cougars defense has allowed just over 33 ppg. Last week Houston allowed 42 points and 538 yards of total offense to a UTEP offense that was averaging just 22.0 ppg.

Senior quarterback Kase Keenum has been something special in the first five games of the season. Keenum has already thrown for 2,005 yards with 14 touchdowns to just two interceptions. He has three games where he has thrown for at least 400 yards, including 471 yards last week against UTEP.

Keenum doesn’t just throw the ball to a couple stud receivers, six different players have at least 10 catches for 151 yards and eight different players have caught at least one touchdown pass.

While most of the success comes through the air, Houston has been able to run the ball very effectively when they choose to. Michael Hayes has a team best 304 yards on 49 attempts with five touchdowns, while Bryce Beall has added another 239 yards and five scores.

The East Carolina defense doesn’t figure to have much hope against the Cougars. The Pirates are allowing just 183.8 passing yards a game, but haven’t faced a quarterback as skilled as Keenum. They are also extremely poor against the run, giving up 201.0 ypg.

Betting Trends:

East Carolina is 7-1 ATS in their last 8 games following a double-digit loss at home, but just 7-15 ATS in their last 22 road games.

Houston is 5-1 ATS in their last 6 games as a home favorite of 3.5-10.0, but just 1-4 ATS in their last 5 games after allowing more than 450 total yards in their previous game.

Steve Janus went a perfect 5-0 last Saturday and is 13-2 over his last 15 college football plays. Be sure to stop back and see who the expert has picked to win in week 6!

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