LAS VEGAS — The 2014 college football season is finally upon us, and this is a tough time for oddsmakers, who — like handicappers — do their best to project how good and bad teams will be early on, before adjusting their numbers as the year progresses. Johnny Avello, The Wynn's executive director of race and sports operations, has been busy bracing for the storm of betting activity that will take place over the next five days with dozens games on the Week 1 board.
“These games have been up a couple weeks, so there have been some wiseguy moves early, and then they kind of settle out," Avello told The Linemakers on Sporting News this week. "On big game days, they’ll get hit pretty hard. A lot of times, the favorite gets whacked, so they end up going back the other way.
“It’s hard to gauge the first week out of the box. You only can go by any personnel changes — some teams will lose like 20 guys, but they’re still going to be good. But you don’t know that yet. In pro football, we know that. This is hard. We know (only) so much early, we know a lot more after the first week, and we get a little more knowledgeable as we go on.”
The biggest game kicking off tonight features two top 25 teams from the SEC, with the ninth-ranked South Carolina Gamecocks hosting the 21st-ranked Texas A&M Aggies (6 p.m. ET, SEC). These schools have not played each other in the two previous years Texas A&M has been in the conference, and both are breaking in new quarterbacks, with former Aggie Johnny Manziel and Gamecock Connor Shaw now teammates with the NFL’s Cleveland Browns.
“We opened that game (South Carolina -10), it’s been up as high as 11, and we’re at 10.5 (as of this morning),” Avello said. “I know Johnny Football’s not there, but A&M is still a quality program. There’s a lot of new players, a lot of players left over from last season, but not the quarterback. And that’s what they’re associated with.
“The win total on South Carolina this year is 9.5, so they’re expected to have a good season, and they certainly wouldn’t want to stumble out of the blocks right here. The game has moved a little between 10 and 11, but I’m sure there will be a play on that game.”
While Aggies vs. Gamecocks may be the biggest matchup on Thursday, the biggest line move so far belongs to a non-conference game between the Wake Forest Demon Deacons and Louisiana-Monroe Warhawks (7 p.m., ESPNU). The Warhawks won 21-19 at Wake Forest last year as 2.5-point underdogs and will be facing a rebuilding Demon Deacons team.
“Wake Forest is a huge move,” Avello said. “We opened up Wake Forest -4, we’re now at Monroe -1. That game moved fast. Wake Forest, there’s not a lot there. Maybe the Monroe team has some better athletes than we’re all anticipating. That is a lot of movement, we’ll see if that holds up.”
Read Matty's full college football line report right here at The Linemakers on Sporting News.