Ball State +190 over GEORGIA STATE
2 unit play
7:00 PM EST. The start of a new season brings plenty of coaching changes and in many cases there is an overreaction to a change that the markets views as a negative one. Out the door for the Cardinals is Pete Lembo, who has spent the past five years at Ball State. Lembo had plenty of success at Ball State, as he guided the Cardinals to a 10–3 overall record in 2013, including a second straight bowl appearance when Ball State played in the GoDaddy Bowl. It marked only the second time in 89 years of football that the Cardinals have played in back-to-back bowl games. He was also the first Ball State head coach in the school's history to win 30 games in his first four seasons at the helm. Combine Lembo’s departure with the Cardinals awful season a year ago (losers of eight of their past nine games) and the result is a great buy low opportunity. The coaching change, viewed in the market as a negative one, actually comes at the perfect time.
Enter the enthusiastic Mike Neu, a former Ball State quarterback that was the MAC Offensive Player of the Year in 1993. He was also the quarterbacks coach for the New Orleans Saints of the National Football League. The Ball State job is his first as a head coach and he has plenty of weapons to work with. Riley Neal will line up under center after a promising freshman campaign in Muncie. Last season Neal took over for quarterback Jack Milas at halftime of a loss at Texas A&M and two weeks later earned the starting spot for the rest of the year. Neal showed that in the air and on the ground he can be a top MAC quarterback. His freshman year peaked with a 393-yard 4-touchdown performance against Northern Illinois.The Cardinals return their top three running backs from a season ago, led by Darian Green who was tops in the MAC, averaging better than 121 all-purpose yards per contest. Ball State’s defense also has plenty of talent. Last year was just one of those seasons where everything went wrong for the Cardinals. They are actually a very good squad that underachieved and could not recover.
Georgia State is from the weaker Sun Belt Conference. The Panthers went 6-5 last season before losing to San Jose State in the Autonation Cure Bowl. This is a squad that lost to Charlotte and Liberty also. However, the Panthers did beat Ball State (31-19) so naturally one of their calls to schedule games was to Ball State again. That is likely to backfire. Nick Arbuckle, the Georgia State quarterback who shredded the Cardinals for 412 yards through the air in that win, has graduated. His replacement is Emiere Scaife. While we give the Panthers credit for their continued ascent up the Sun Belt landscape, they are still a new member to FBS football. The Panthers went 1-23 in their first 24 games before last year’s improvement. They are still not in the same class as Ball State so let’s look at that for a moment. That game last season between these two was played at Ball State. At the time, the wheels were starting to come off the Cardinals but they were a 14-point favorite. Less than a year later with the same personnel, the Cardinals are taking back points against a Panthers team that is forced to hand the reins over to a new QB that has been sitting on the bench for two years. Emiere Scaife did play eight plays in total over the past two years and attempted eight passes. He completed none and now there is a 19-point (!) swing in the number because of one result? That's value. Ball State outright gets this call.
2 unit play
7:00 PM EST. The start of a new season brings plenty of coaching changes and in many cases there is an overreaction to a change that the markets views as a negative one. Out the door for the Cardinals is Pete Lembo, who has spent the past five years at Ball State. Lembo had plenty of success at Ball State, as he guided the Cardinals to a 10–3 overall record in 2013, including a second straight bowl appearance when Ball State played in the GoDaddy Bowl. It marked only the second time in 89 years of football that the Cardinals have played in back-to-back bowl games. He was also the first Ball State head coach in the school's history to win 30 games in his first four seasons at the helm. Combine Lembo’s departure with the Cardinals awful season a year ago (losers of eight of their past nine games) and the result is a great buy low opportunity. The coaching change, viewed in the market as a negative one, actually comes at the perfect time.
Enter the enthusiastic Mike Neu, a former Ball State quarterback that was the MAC Offensive Player of the Year in 1993. He was also the quarterbacks coach for the New Orleans Saints of the National Football League. The Ball State job is his first as a head coach and he has plenty of weapons to work with. Riley Neal will line up under center after a promising freshman campaign in Muncie. Last season Neal took over for quarterback Jack Milas at halftime of a loss at Texas A&M and two weeks later earned the starting spot for the rest of the year. Neal showed that in the air and on the ground he can be a top MAC quarterback. His freshman year peaked with a 393-yard 4-touchdown performance against Northern Illinois.The Cardinals return their top three running backs from a season ago, led by Darian Green who was tops in the MAC, averaging better than 121 all-purpose yards per contest. Ball State’s defense also has plenty of talent. Last year was just one of those seasons where everything went wrong for the Cardinals. They are actually a very good squad that underachieved and could not recover.
Georgia State is from the weaker Sun Belt Conference. The Panthers went 6-5 last season before losing to San Jose State in the Autonation Cure Bowl. This is a squad that lost to Charlotte and Liberty also. However, the Panthers did beat Ball State (31-19) so naturally one of their calls to schedule games was to Ball State again. That is likely to backfire. Nick Arbuckle, the Georgia State quarterback who shredded the Cardinals for 412 yards through the air in that win, has graduated. His replacement is Emiere Scaife. While we give the Panthers credit for their continued ascent up the Sun Belt landscape, they are still a new member to FBS football. The Panthers went 1-23 in their first 24 games before last year’s improvement. They are still not in the same class as Ball State so let’s look at that for a moment. That game last season between these two was played at Ball State. At the time, the wheels were starting to come off the Cardinals but they were a 14-point favorite. Less than a year later with the same personnel, the Cardinals are taking back points against a Panthers team that is forced to hand the reins over to a new QB that has been sitting on the bench for two years. Emiere Scaife did play eight plays in total over the past two years and attempted eight passes. He completed none and now there is a 19-point (!) swing in the number because of one result? That's value. Ball State outright gets this call.
