{"id":11180,"date":"2010-12-01T22:49:31","date_gmt":"2010-12-02T03:49:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=11180"},"modified":"2010-12-01T22:49:31","modified_gmt":"2010-12-02T03:49:31","slug":"pac-10-expert-picks-arizona-state-sun-devils-at-arizona-wildcats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/pac-10-expert-picks-arizona-state-sun-devils-at-arizona-wildcats-11180\/","title":{"rendered":"Pac-10 Expert Picks: Arizona State Sun Devils at Arizona Wildcats"},"content":{"rendered":"

Arizona State Sun Devils at Arizona Wildcats
\nThursday, 12\/2\/10, 8:00 PM EDT, TV:\u00a0 ESPN
\nOpening Point Spread:\u00a0 Arizona -6
\nCurrent Betting Line:\u00a0 Arizona -5.5
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 54.5
\nCurrent Total:\u00a0 54.5
\nCurrent Moneyline:\u00a0 Arizona -230 \/ Arizona State +190<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Arizona Wildcats QB Nick Foles threw for a career-high 448 yards last week and now gets set to face the rival Sun Devils in Tuscon<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Arizona State rallied back after falling behind by 17 points in the first quarter to pick up a dominating 55-34 win over the UCLA Bruins last week.\u00a0 The Sun Devils are 5-6 on the year and due to one of their two victories over FCS teams counting toward the six needed to become bowl eligible, they will need too-few teams to qualify for bowls to participate in the postseason.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s a big game,\u201d said Dennis Erickson.\u00a0 \u201cWhen you have two universities in the state, in the same league like we are and like some of the others in our conference, it is huge.\u201d\u00a0 This will be the 84th Duel in the Desert, with Arizona State trailing in the series, 36-46-1.\u00a0 The team is 2-0 ATS this season as an underdog of 3.5 to 10 points and is listed as a 5.5-point underdog on the college football lines page.<\/p>\n

The Sun Devils 55 points last week was their highest total of the season, eclipsing the 54 they scored in the season opener against Portland State.\u00a0 Arizona State has a new quarterback after 11 games of the season, as sophomore Brock Osweiler took over for starter Steven Threet due to a concussion he suffered in the second series lat week.\u00a0 He completed 27 of 36 passes for 380 yards and four touchdowns.\u00a0 \u201cHe was outstanding,\u201d said Erickson.\u00a0 \u201cHe didn\u2019t turn the football over and he threw it accurately.\u201d<\/p>\n

The offense will still rely heavily on a running game that has 18 touchdowns this season after running for 14 all of last year.<\/p>\n

Arizona played No. 1 Oregon tough in the first half and went into the break with a 19-14 lead, but the Ducks were simply too much in rushing for 389 yards in a 48-29 win.\u00a0 The Wildcats entered the month of November with a 7-1 record, but now enter the regular-season finale with a 7-4 mark.\u00a0 Offensively, the team has had little trouble moving the ball during its three-game losing streak, compiling 1,324 yards in that span.\u00a0 The problem has been on defense, surrendering 1,435 yards over that span.\u00a0 Quarterback Nick Foles threw for a career-high 448 yards last week, but even that wasn\u2019t enough in overcoming the leaky defense.\u00a0 The team is 4-4 ATS as a favorite this year.<\/p>\n

The Wildcats problems begin and end in the red zone, as the offense ranks 112th in the nation by scoring on just 73 percent of its trips.\u00a0 Arizona will likely not improve upon that ranking due to ranking 4th nationally in red zone defense, allowing only 23 scores on 48 trips.\u00a0 With Foles throwing the ball around in recent weeks, the team\u2019s average of 314 yards passing per game would set a season record if it holds up, eclipsing the 308.5 yards per game mark that the 2007 squad posted.<\/p>\n

Bettors will be interested in knowing that the Sun Devils are 0-5 ATS in December, while the Wildcats are 3-11 ATS in their last 14 games as a home favorite of 3.5 to 10 points.<\/p>\n

The college football handicappers at Maddux Sports are enjoying a red-hot season and ready to deliver in the season\u2019s final six weeks!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Arizona State Sun Devils at Arizona Wildcats Thursday, 12\/2\/10, 8:00 PM EDT, TV:\u00a0 ESPN Opening Point Spread:\u00a0 Arizona -6 Current Betting Line:\u00a0 Arizona -5.5 Opening Total:\u00a0 54.5 Current Total:\u00a0 54.5 Current Moneyline:\u00a0 Arizona -230 \/ Arizona State +190 Arizona State rallied back after falling behind by 17 points in the first quarter to pick up […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":4105,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[200,1444],"tags":[439,578,4031,2255,3584],"class_list":["post-11180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-college-football","category-headlines","tag-arizona-state-sun-devils","tag-arizona-wildcats","tag-brock-osweiler","tag-dennis-erickson","tag-nick-foles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11180","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=11180"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11180\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11182,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11180\/revisions\/11182"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4105"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}