SMU at Houston Line

Written by Steve Janus - Google +

The No. 11 Houston Cougars will look to remain one of the three unbeaten teams in college football when they host the SMU Mustangs this Saturday. The Cougars rolled 73-17 at Tulane to improve to 10-0 overall and 6-0 in Conference USA. The Mustangs lost 17-24 at Navy in their final non-conference matchup,dropping them to 6-4 overall and 4-2 inside the conference. Houston dominated SMU 45-20 last year, despite coming into the game as 8-point underdogs.

Taking a look at the week 12 college football lines, oddsmakers currently have the Cougars favored by 19.5-points over the Mustangs with the total set at 75.5 points.

SMU:

Things have not been going the Mustang’s way over the last four games. SMU is just 1-3 since opening the season 5-1 that included an impressive 40-33 overtime win over TCU. Their last two trips on the road in conference play have been pretty brutal. They lost 3-27 at Southern Miss followed by a 7-38 loss at Tulsa. The Mustangs are going to come in with the attitude that they can keep this game close and possibly win it at the end, but they are going to have to play flawless for an entire 48-minutes to upset the Cougars.

In their last game against Navy, SMU outgained the Midshipmen 386 to 335 in total yards, but were unable to find the endzone until the third quarter. Starting quarterback J.J. McDermott threw for 249 yards and a touchdown on 26 of 36 passing, but threw two interceptions inside Navy territory that kept points off the board.

The Mustangs also got a big game out of junior running back Zack Line, who carried 24 times for 135 yards, but he was kept out of the endzone for after scoring four touchdowns in his previous two games.

SMU’s offense figures to put up some big time numbers against the Cougars this Saturday. Houston is 65th in total yards allowed (393.2 ypg), and have really struggled stopping the run, giving up just over 184 ypg.

Houston:

Houston hasn’t just been beating teams of late, they have been absolutely destroying their opposition. Their 56-point win over Tulane was their third win this season by more than 50 points and the fifth straight game where they won by at least 35.

Senior quarterback Kase Keenum and the Houston passing attack have done as they please against opposing secondaries. Keenum had a bit of an off day against Tulane, throwing for just 325 yards and three touchdowns, but that was because the Houston rushing attack put up 292 yards and four touchdowns on the ground. Even with a mediocre performance on his standards, Keenum has thrown for 1,641 yards with 20 touchdowns to just one interception over his last four games.

Houston averages a whopping 628.8 yards of total offense a game, and even a stingy SMU defense that allows just 345.2 ypg figures to have no chance of slowing this offense down. The one thing you have to worry about if you plan on taking the Cougars this weekend, is this team could have their eyes set on a huge game against Tulsa next week, who is also 6-0 in conference play.