{"id":11039,"date":"2010-11-27T09:07:37","date_gmt":"2010-11-27T14:07:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=11039"},"modified":"2010-11-27T09:07:37","modified_gmt":"2010-11-27T14:07:37","slug":"michigan-state-spartans-vs-penn-state-nittany-lions-college-football-predictions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/michigan-state-spartans-vs-penn-state-nittany-lions-college-football-predictions-11039\/","title":{"rendered":"Michigan State Spartans vs Penn State Nittany Lions College Football Predictions"},"content":{"rendered":"

Michigan State Spartans at Penn State Nittany Lions
\nSaturday, 11\/27\/10, 12:00 PM EDT, TV:\u00a0 ESPN2
\nOpening Point Spread:\u00a0 Michigan State -2
\nCurrent Betting Line:\u00a0 Michigan State -1.5
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 51
\nCurrent Total:\u00a0 51
\nCurrent Moneyline:\u00a0 Michigan State -125 \/ Penn State +105<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Penn<\/a>
Penn State has produced a 19-1 record on Senior Day since the 1990 season<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Michigan State can earn at least a share of the Big Ten championship Saturday with a victory in visiting the Penn State Nittany Lions in Happy Valley.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019ve talked a lot about leaving a legacy here in our time and we want to leave something that people will remember,\u201d said quarterback Kirk Cousins.\u00a0 \u201cWe have a chance to do that Saturday.\u201d\u00a0 The junior quarterback has been struggling with his accuracy lately, which has been directly contributed to an ankle injury that has been bother him for weeks.\u00a0 Today\u2019s game marks the 28th meeting between the two teams, as the Spartans trail in the series, 12-14-1, including a 4-9-1 mark in games played in State College.\u00a0 The team is 5-1 ATS as a road favorite the past three years and the college football lines page has them favored by less than a field goal.<\/p>\n

The Spartans have lost eight-straight games in Beaver Stadium, including a 49-18 loss on November 22, 2008.\u00a0 Michigan State\u2019s last win in State College came on September 25, 1965, 23-0 in the year before Penn State head coach Joe Paterno took over the program.\u00a0 A trademark of Mark Dantonio\u2019s Michigan State teams has been their ability to produce wins late in the regular season.\u00a0 Under Dantonio, the Spartans are 8-3 in games played in November.\u00a0 In the four seasons prior to his arrival, the program went just 2-11 during the month.\u00a0 The defense will need to come up big in this contest, ranking No. 23 in scoring defense, surrendering just 19.9 points per game, while also ranking 23rd in turnover margin.<\/p>\n

Penn State has won four of its last five games and eighteen seniors will be playing their final game in Beaver Stadium.\u00a0 The Nittany Lions will also be celebrating the fact that head coach Joe Paterno has announced he\u2019ll be coming back for the 2011 season.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019ve struggled a bit this year, the youth and injuries and the whole bit,\u201d he commented.\u00a0 \u201cBut I think with a good spring and preseason practice, we\u2019re going to be a good football team.\u201d\u00a0 He has garnered a 13-5 record against the Spartans, including a 49-18 win in 2008 to keep Michigan State from a share of the conference title on his way to the Rose Bowl.\u00a0 The squad is 5-5 ATS in all games this year.<\/p>\n

The Nittany Lions will have faced four opponents that are ranked in the Top 25 of the BCS this year in taking on the No. 10 Spartans in the rankings.\u00a0 Penn State has a good chance of pulling off the victory knowing the program has won 19 of its last 20 Senior Day games since 1990.\u00a0 The lone loss came to Michigan in 1999.\u00a0 The recent strong play from the team is directly associated with the emergence of redshirt sophomore quarterback Matt McGloin, who threw for a career-high 315 yards in last week\u2019s 41-24 win over Indiana.\u00a0 For the season, McGloin is 78 of 131 for 1,025 yards with 11 touchdowns and three interceptions.<\/p>\n

Bettors will be interested in knowing that the Spartans are 4-4 ATS as a favorite this year, while the Nittany Lions are 3-9 ATS as an underdog.<\/p>\n

The college football handicappers at Maddux Sports have released a 20-Unit Game of the Year in one of today\u2019s games.\u00a0 Don\u2019t miss it!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Michigan State Spartans at Penn State Nittany Lions Saturday, 11\/27\/10, 12:00 PM EDT, TV:\u00a0 ESPN2 Opening Point Spread:\u00a0 Michigan State -2 Current Betting Line:\u00a0 Michigan State -1.5 Opening Total:\u00a0 51 Current Total:\u00a0 51 Current Moneyline:\u00a0 Michigan State -125 \/ Penn State +105 Michigan State can earn at least a share of the Big Ten championship […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":4098,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[200,1444],"tags":[90,3991,584,3990,3238,3852,500,497],"class_list":["post-11039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-college-football","category-headlines","tag-bcs","tag-beaver-stadium","tag-joe-paterno","tag-kirk-cousins","tag-mark-dantonio","tag-matt-mcgloin","tag-michigan-state-spartans","tag-penn-state-nittany-lions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11039","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11039"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11039\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11040,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11039\/revisions\/11040"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}