While Colorado vs. West Virginia may be the marquee game on the Thursday night college football card, it is not necessarily the top contest from a standpoint of beating the college football odds.
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Fletcher is the Golden Eagles all-time leading rusher and Brown last year's top receiver. To make things worse, Fletcher's replacement Tory Harrison could be limited with a lower leg contusion.
Southern Miss is 3-1 straight up, but 1-2 to the number. Though the home team is 4-0 straight up in their games, the road team is 3-1 in the wallet.
UAB is 1-3 straight up and against the spread with their one win and cover coming at home.
The old adage may be "run and stop the run" but the Blazers struggles are an inability to pass and stop the pass.
Offensively, Alabama-Birmingham is getting 230 rushing yards per game against teams normally allowing just 143. That's on 6.4 yards per rush to 4.5. However they get a full yard per pass less than their opponents normally give up.
Defensively, they allow 4.2 yards per rush to teams normally getting 4.0 but their pass defense is an abomination allowing 8.6 yards per pass to teams normally getting 6.9. Overall they are allowing 6.5 yards per play to 5.5.
The Golden Eagles are above average on offense getting 5.0 yards per rush against teams normally allowing 4.1, while the passing yards per attempt ratio is 7.2 to 6.5.
While their pass defense is average, their run defense allows 1.8 yards per rush to teams normally getting 3.0.
Against the spread records: The Golden Eagles are 9-2 their last 11 road games and 0-6 after getting more than 280 yards passing last game.
The Blazers are 10-1 as home underdogs of 3.5-10.
Top expert pick on this game: Service out of
