{"id":18763,"date":"2011-10-21T10:12:04","date_gmt":"2011-10-21T15:12:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=18763"},"modified":"2011-10-21T10:12:04","modified_gmt":"2011-10-21T15:12:04","slug":"college-football-picks-week-8-usc-trojans-vs-notre-dame-fighting-irish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/college-football-picks-week-8-usc-trojans-vs-notre-dame-fighting-irish-18763\/","title":{"rendered":"College Football Picks Week 8: USC Trojans vs. Notre Dame Fighting Irish"},"content":{"rendered":"

USC Trojans at Notre Dame Fighting Irish
\nSaturday, 10\/22\/11, 7:30 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 NBC
\nOpening Point Spread:\u00a0 Notre Dame -9
\nCurrent Betting Line:\u00a0 Notre Dame -9.5
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 57.5
\nCurrent Total:\u00a0 57
\nOdds Courtesy of Bookmaker<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Matt<\/a>
The USC Trojans are big road underdogs against the Notre Dame Fighting Irish Saturday<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

USC takes a break from Pac-12 Conference play and travels to Notre Dame for the greatest intersectional rivalry in college football.\u00a0 The Trojans will be playing their first night game at Notre Dame Stadium and the latest start time of any game in the rivalry.\u00a0 The program has won its last four visits to South Bend, while also winning a school-record 13 consecutive non-conference road games.\u00a0 USC is 13-6 ATS as an underdog of 3.5 to 10 points, while the \u2018under\u2019 is 11-8 in those contests.<\/p>\n

The Trojans are led by the talented pass-catch duo of quarterback Matt Barkley and wide receiver Robert Woods.\u00a0 USC head coach Lane Kiffin knows his team is up against it.\u00a0 \u201cThey very easily could be undefeated and be a top-five team in the country,\u201d he stated this week.\u00a0 \u201cOne or two players here, they\u2019d be undefeated.\u201d\u00a0 Defensively, the team will be challenged in facing a hurry-up spread of Notre Dame, as the unit struggled against Arizona State and Arizona in giving up a combined 84 points.<\/p>\n

Notre Dame is 4-2 and comes in on a four-game winning streak, including consecutive spread victories over Purdue and Air Force.\u00a0 The Fighting Irish have really gotten their ground game going, rushing for 735 yards in the last three games, the most for the program since a stretch in 2003.\u00a0 Second-year head coach Brian Kelly has his team focused on reaching a BCS game, which would likely mean winning every remaining game on the schedule.\u00a0 \u201cLet\u2019s get into the top 14 in the country,\u201d he stated in practice this week.\u00a0 Notre Dame is 6-14 ATS as favorites and the \u2018under\u2019 is 14-8 over that span.<\/p>\n

The Fighting Irish are seventh in the nation in averaging 6.0 yards per carry, while the offense has scored on 10 straight trips inside the red zone, including nine touchdowns.\u00a0 Notre Dame\u2019s offensive line has been very good in allowing just five sacks this season, allowing quarterback Tommy Rees to throw a touchdown pass in each of his nine career starts.\u00a0 Turnovers plagued the team early this season, but that hasn\u2019t been the case in the last two games, failing to not commit a miscue in consecutive games for the first time since Oct. 2009.\u00a0 Notre Dame has tallied a 48-16-1 record against Pac-12 Conference opponents at home.<\/p>\n

Bettors will likely back the Trojans due to their 6-0 ATS mark as a road underdog of 3.5 to 10 points, while the Fighting Irish are 10-3 ATS following a bye week.<\/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":"

USC Trojans at Notre Dame Fighting Irish Saturday, 10\/22\/11, 7:30 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 NBC Opening Point Spread:\u00a0 Notre Dame -9 Current Betting Line:\u00a0 Notre Dame -9.5 Opening Total:\u00a0 57.5 Current Total:\u00a0 57 Odds Courtesy of Bookmaker USC takes a break from Pac-12 Conference play and travels to Notre Dame for the greatest intersectional rivalry in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":4008,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[200,1444],"tags":[1089,1311,3384,5089,472],"class_list":["post-18763","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-college-football","category-headlines","tag-matt-barkley","tag-notre-dame-fighting-irish","tag-robert-woods","tag-tommy-rees","tag-usc-trojans"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18763","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=18763"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18763\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18764,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18763\/revisions\/18764"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18763"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18763"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18763"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}