{"id":18591,"date":"2011-10-14T19:44:53","date_gmt":"2011-10-15T00:44:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=18591"},"modified":"2011-10-14T19:44:53","modified_gmt":"2011-10-15T00:44:53","slug":"conference-usa-football-picks-ucf-knights-vs-smu-mustangs-saturday-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/conference-usa-football-picks-ucf-knights-vs-smu-mustangs-saturday-preview-18591\/","title":{"rendered":"Conference-USA Football Picks: UCF Knights vs. SMU Mustangs, Saturday Preview"},"content":{"rendered":"

UCF Knights at SMU Mustangs
\nSaturday, 10\/15\/11, 3:30 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 N\/A
\nOpening Point Spread:\u00a0 SMU -1
\nCurrent Betting Line:\u00a0 SMU -3.5
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 44.5
\nCurrent Total:\u00a0 46.5
\nOdds Courtesy of Bookmaker<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
The UCF Knights are underdogs despite winning all three previous meetings in this series<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Central Florida is ready for a rematch of last year\u2019s Conference-USA Championship Game, especially considering the program has won all three previous meetings in this series.\u00a0 The Knights came away with a 17-7 win in that particular contest and remains one of the top defensive teams in the country, ranking second among all teams nationally in total defense and scoring defense.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re trying to be the best defense out there.\u00a0 From the moment since I first stepped on campus,\u201d commented Knights corner back Josh Robinson.\u00a0 UCF is 21-9 ATS over the last two-plus seasons.<\/p>\n

The Knights have jumped out to early leads this season, outscoring opponents by a 41-6 margin in the first quarter.\u00a0 It\u2019s important to note that UCF was out-gained in total yards in the previous two meetings between these teams, but held SMU to under 100 rushing yards in each.\u00a0 The Knights lead the overall turnover battle in this series with a plus-seven margin.\u00a0 The program has won seven consecutive games against teams from the C-USA West Division.\u00a0 A key to this game will be a rush defense that ranks eighth in the nation in allowing just 77.4 yards per game.<\/p>\n

SMU is riding a four-game winning streak that includes a 40-33 win over the TCU Horned Frogs as 13-point road underdogs two weeks ago.\u00a0 The Mustangs have battled back this year after a 46-14 season-opening loss to the Texas A&M Aggies.\u00a0 Offensively, the team ranks third in the conference in averaging 32.8 points per game.\u00a0 Quarterback J.J. McDermott is 4-0 since taking over as a starter in the second game of the season.\u00a0 SMU is 1-6 ATS as a favorite of 3.5 to 10 points.<\/p>\n

The Mustangs aren\u2019t just a passing team anymore, as junior running back Zach Line leads the conference in both scoring and rushing.\u00a0 He has ran for 100-plus yards in four of five games this season, currently totaling 2,226 yards in his career.\u00a0 On the outside, wide receiver Darius Johnson is a standout player, leading C-USA with a 110-yard per game average.<\/p>\n

Bettors will likely back the Knights due to their 7-0 ATS mark as an underdog of 3.5 to 10 points, while the Mustangs are 0-6 ATS when favored in that range.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Don\u2019t miss out on a winning season and let the college football handicappers at Maddux Sports line your pockets with cash.\u00a0 Long term packages are available now!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UCF Knights at SMU Mustangs Saturday, 10\/15\/11, 3:30 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 N\/A Opening Point Spread:\u00a0 SMU -1 Current Betting Line:\u00a0 SMU -3.5 Opening Total:\u00a0 44.5 Current Total:\u00a0 46.5 Odds Courtesy of Bookmaker Central Florida is ready for a rematch of last year\u2019s Conference-USA Championship Game, especially considering the program has won all three previous meetings […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":16530,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[200,1444],"tags":[2558,435,3261,5494],"class_list":["post-18591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-college-football","category-headlines","tag-conference-usa","tag-smu-mustangs","tag-ucf-knights","tag-zach-line"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18591","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=18591"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18591\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18592,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18591\/revisions\/18592"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16530"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}