Featured Game: Northern Illinois Huskies vs. Maryland Terrapins (-17 / 46.5 under -112)
Time: 7:30 pm ET / 4:30 pm PT
Television: BTN, Fox One
Maryland is somewhat overvalued after their blowout win against Florida Atlantic who moved the football well enough but FAU kept turning the football over and getting stopped on 4th down. Despite only allowing 7 points, it wasn’t like the Terrapins totally shut down the Owls offense a week ago and I’m not entirely buying into Maryland on defense being good just yet and I think that can allow this Northern Illinois team to hang around and be competitive in this game. The offensive performance was ugly for NIU last week against Holy Cross but I think some of that was them holding a lot of the playbook back for this game. I expect a better and more aggressive performance on offense for the Huskies led by QB Josh Holst who was MVP of the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl last year in their win against Fresno State. It’s worth mentioning that long-term this MAC squad has been a good double digit underdog against the spread. Let’s not forget NIU’s upset win as massive underdogs of 4 TD’s at Notre Dame last season which was also a Week 2 game early in the season. I think Northern Illinois keeps it within this double digit number as well.
Pick: Northern Illinois +17 -110