The No. 21 Baylor Bears travel to face the Rice Owls on Friday, September 16th in an in-state showdown. The Bears have won seven straight meetings with the Owls while covering the spread in all seven games. They beat Rice 70-17 last year as 33-point home favorites.
Baylor (2-0) is coming off a couple of laughers to open the 2016 campaign. It beat Northwestern State 55-7 in Week 1 before topping SMU 40-13 at home last week.
Rice (0-2) hasn’t looked too competitive in its first two contests. It lost 14-46 as 19-point road underdogs to Western Kentucky in its opener and 14-31 as 8.5-point road dogs to Army last week.
Kickoff inside Rice Stadium is set for 8:00 EST Friday night with ESPN providing the television coverage. If you are looking to wager on this game, you’ll find a line of Baylor -30.5 over Rice and a total set of 65.5 points.
Rice hasn’t shown great on the road in its first two games with tough matchups against Western Kentucky and Army. After losing both contests and failing to cover the spread in each, I believe Rice is now undervalued and catching too many points here as 30.5-point dogs to Baylor.
Rice will be looking forward to this game because it will be its first home and and it will be on the National TV stage with ESPN providing the television coverage. The Owls will show up, and when they do, they should be good enough to stay within 30.5 points of Baylor.
The Bears clearly aren’t the same dominant team they have been the past few years. They failed to cover as 50-point favorites in a 55-7 win over Northwestern State, and also didn’t cover as 34.5-point favorites in a 40-13 home win over SMU last week.
That game against SMU was much closer than the final score would indicate. The Bears only outgained the Mustangs by 131 total yards in the game, 536-405. This was actually a 6-6 game at halftime before the Bears blew it open in the second half. Being tied at halftime against SMU at home is a sign that the Bears are vulnerable.
Yes, Baylor has gone 7-0 SU & 7-0 ATS in its last seven meetings with Rice. However, only once during this stretch have they beaten Rice by more than 25 points.
Yes, Baylor has gone 7-0 SU & 7-0 ATS in its last seven meetings with Rice. However, only once during this stretch have they beaten Rice by more than 25 points. This is a much better Rice team than the one the Bears faced last year as the Owls have 16 returning starters this year. This is a much worse Bears team as they brought back just 10 starters this season and lost head coach Art Briles.
Rice is 72-44 ATS in its last 116 home games, including 40-20 ATS in its last 60 games as a home underdog. The Owls are 20-6 ATS in their last 26 games off two consecutive games with a turnover margin of -1 or worse. The Bears are 0-5 ATS in their last five games following a win.