{"id":8998,"date":"2010-10-15T10:55:40","date_gmt":"2010-10-15T15:55:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=8998"},"modified":"2010-10-15T10:54:25","modified_gmt":"2010-10-15T15:54:25","slug":"cincinnati-bearcats-at-louisville-cardinals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/cincinnati-bearcats-at-louisville-cardinals-8998\/","title":{"rendered":"Friday Football Picks: Cincinnati Bearcats at Louisville Cardinals"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cincinnati Bearcats at Louisville Cardinals
\nFriday, 10\/15\/10, 8:00 PM EDT, TV:\u00a0 ESPN
\nOpening Point Spread: Cincinnati -3.5
\nCurrent Betting Line: Cincinnati -3
\nOpening Total: 54.5
\nCurrent Total: 56.5
\nCurrent Moneyline: Cincy\/-150\/Louisville +130<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Zach Collaros and the Cincinnati Bearcats are 3 point road favorites over Louisville on Friday night<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Cincinnati is set to battle Louisville for the 50th time in the battle for the Keg of Nails, leading the all-time series 27-21-1, including a 12-9-1 advantage in games played in Louisville.\u00a0 First-year head coach Butch Jones is concerned that the Cardinals\u2019 balance will present problems for his defense in this contest by saying, \u201cWe\u2019ve got to take something away from them.\u00a0 We need to take great strides this week playing a very good football team.\u201d\u00a0 Jones is 2-3 in his first season after leading Central Michigan to a 29-16 overall record and a 23-3 mark in league games.\u00a0 Tonight\u2019s game serves as the Big East opener for the Bearcats, as they have won 12-straight conference games and two consecutive league championships.\u00a0 The team is 9-5\u00a0against the college football point spread\u00a0versus Big East rivals over the last three years and the total is 8-6 Over\/Under in those contests.<\/p>\n

The Bearcats offense seems to finely be at full-strength with a healthy Isaiah Pead in the backfield, as he rushed for 197 yards in helping the team roll up 609 total yards of offense in last week\u2019s win over Miami (OH).\u00a0 \u201cIt all stems from balance,\u201d Jones said.\u00a0 \u201cAny time a defense can make you one dimensional, it\u2019s tough.\u201d\u00a0 Cincinnati had 384 rushing yards last week, ranking ninth on the school\u2019s all-time list.\u00a0 On the other side of the ball, the defense starts no seniors and features seven first-year starters, but ranks eighth in the country and leads the Big East in allowing just 84.8 rushing yards per game.\u00a0 Three of the five opponents have been held to under two yards a carry, including the prolific rushing attacks of Fresno State and Oklahoma.<\/p>\n

Louisville comes in with a 3-2 overall record and enters its conference opener off a 56-0 blowout victory at home over Memphis last Saturday.\u00a0 \u201cWhat we have done is broken this season into three phases,\u201d first-year head coach Charlie Strong commented.\u00a0 \u201cPhase one was Kentucky.\u00a0 Phase two was Eastern Kentucky, Oregon State, Arkansas State and Memphis.\u00a0 Now, we are into phase three.\u201d\u00a0 The Cardinals put up 35 points and 380 yards of total offense in total offense in the first half to put together its most complete performance of the season.\u00a0 Jumping out early is nothing new for Strong\u2019s squad, outscoring the opposition by a 109-48 margin in the opening 30 minutes this season.\u00a0 The team is 3-11 ATS versus conference opponents over the last three years and the total is 6-8 Over\/Under in those contests.<\/p>\n

The Cardinals have been led offensively by senior quarterback Adam Froman, who has been especially dominant over the last three games.\u00a0 He has thrown for 831 yards and eight touchdowns, averaging 277.0 yards through the air over that span.\u00a0 After struggling offensively in the first two games, Louisville is averaging 39.3 points per game and 534.0 yards of total offense since then.\u00a0 Defensively, the team has been getting after the quarterback, averaging 3.6 sacks per game that ranks third nationally.\u00a0 Creating pressure in this matchup will be imperative, especially considering that Cincinnati quarterback Zach Collaros threw only two incompletions in last year\u2019s 41-10 Bearcats\u2019 victory.<\/p>\n

Bettors will note that the Bearcats are on a 4-0 ATS run in October and the under is 16-4-1 in their last 21 games during the month.\u00a0 Louisville is also a money-maker this time of year, producing a 7-3 ATS mark in October.\u00a0 Maddux Sports has released a college football pick on tonights game.\u00a0 We have crushed the books this year and will likely nail this game as well.\u00a0 Dont miss this winner or any of the weekend football picks on tap for clients.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cincinnati Bearcats at Louisville Cardinals Friday, 10\/15\/10, 8:00 PM EDT, TV:\u00a0 ESPN Opening Point Spread: Cincinnati -3.5 Current Betting Line: Cincinnati -3 Opening Total: 54.5 Current Total: 56.5 Current Moneyline: Cincy\/-150\/Louisville +130 Cincinnati is set to battle Louisville for the 50th time in the battle for the Keg of Nails, leading the all-time series 27-21-1, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":7056,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[200,1444],"tags":[3361,3359,1237,1152,3360,556,1159],"class_list":["post-8998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-college-football","category-headlines","tag-adam-froman","tag-butch-jones","tag-charlie-strong","tag-cincinnati-bearcats","tag-isaiah-pead","tag-louisville-cardinals","tag-zach-collaros"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8998","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=8998"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8998\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9087,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8998\/revisions\/9087"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}