3. Illinois at Iowa
LINE: Iowa -16
ATS PICK: Illinois
– Bet on this, BetMGM latest line
It’s a game just for the sheer enjoyment and fun of a college football game.
Both teams are going bowling, both are out of the Big Ten West title hunt, and both are looking to move up in the conference’s post-season pecking order.
Iowa is excellent at home – it just took out Minnesota – and it won three of it’s last four, but it doesn’t blow teams out.
At least, it doesn’t blow out the good teams. It shutout Northwestern, but even that was just a 20-0 win.
The Hawkeyes have only scored more than 26 points once all year on a Power Five team, and even then it was only a 30-0 win over Rutgers in early September.
Illinois might be a deeply flawed team, but it’s playing with house money now.
It’s going bowling, it’s on a four-game winning streak, and it has a real shot at getting to eight wins this regular season with a date against Northwestern next week.
The last time it lost, it was blown out by Michigan – and that was only by 17.
Iowa has the defense to shut the lights out on a wildly inconsistent Illini attack, but the team goes in spurts. It can do enough to lose a game by under two touchdowns.