Week 1: Australia?

[ofred]

Glad, like all of you, that college football is back. It has to be my favorite "betting" sport. Bowl season replenished my pool of cash, going 25-16, +47 units. Will be playing 1-10 units as I did in the bowl season. Anyways, let's start with:

3* Hawaii +20 No, this is not a degenerate play. I seriously thought about playing more than 3*. Hawaii has sucked the past few seasons, but when have they played competitively? The first couple of games in each season. This game fits all the scenarios of a first game warm-up for Cal. In Australia, where the players are having fun and seeing the sights. It is a week early, cutting off a week of camp for a fairly new group of offensive players. The timing won't be there, and Davis Webb has almost all new, young receivers. Cal's defense is also breaking in many new starters/ 2nd stringers.

It's supposed to rain heavily through Friday, the day of the game. It's cold, playing on a grass field. I see a bit of a slogging kind of game. Hawaii hired a new HC(Nick Rolovich), who at least inherits an experienced offense. They have a very good RB in Paul Harris, who might keep Hawaii on the field and moving the ball. Rolovich is a solid OC from Nevada who has his team very excited and optimistic about this game and the coming season. Granted, Hawaii doesn't have the talent to compete long-term, but for one game in Australia, a week early, they can keep it close.

 

[sendacash]

Interesting location to open the College football season I must say. I wonder if this game will help plant the seeds of American football with our friends down under? We have already seen the proliferation of Australian rules\Rugby punters throughout the college football ranks, much to the chagrin of some Michigan fans I'm sure. In the 2nd round of this years NFL draft, the Denver Broncos selected Adam Gotsis a defensive linemen out of Georgia Tech. Gotsis, a native of Australia had very little American football experience when he signed on to play for the Yellow Jackets. Maybe this will be somewhat of a recruiting opportunity for both Cal & Hawaii, find some young Aussie rules players who want to play college football in America.




For anyone that's familiar with Australia, I have a couple of questions:




1. Is sports betting legal in Australia and will the locals be able to bet on the game, much like in Europe? I've heard that the Aussies like to gamble. In fact one stat I noticed was that over 80% of Australian adults engage in gambling of some kind, which is the highest rate of gambling in the world. I'm not saying the game might be fixed, but this information is worth knowing imo, also Hawaii has been part of some shady games in the past.


2. What's the legal drinking age in Australia and is it widely enforced? This trip might be seen as a vacation for both teams, one would imagine that almost none of these kids has ever been to Australia so this is almost like some sort of vacation. Usually the vacation\travel factor plays against the visitors in Hawaii games, not the case here.




My numbers lean towards Hawaii, but I can't feel very confident in my number on Cal with their new QB situation as Webb was highly regarded by some. Will Webb be able to just step into Goff's shoes and the Bears not miss a beat on offense? I kind of doubt it, but would feel a lot better about this game if it were being played in Honolulu where the Rainbows have a history of covering as home underdogs. I also like to take the MWC team in these PAC-12 match-ups as they tend to come out fired up wanting to take it to a power 5 conference team from the same region. However, my power rating on Hawaii is borderline below the Mendoza line on teams I would consider betting, wedged somewhere between Fla Intl & Tulane. I might be more willing to look the other way on that condition if this game were being played in Honolulu.

 

[JAKEPEAVY21]

Hawaii has a ton of returning starters so not a bad play just based on that.

 

[indiana]

Fred............good to see you..........BOL with this week and season action............indy

 

[ofred]

Fred............good to see you..........BOL with this week and season action............indy

Thanks Indy. Who doesn't love college football?

As for the drinking age in Australia, it's 18. I don't think that or sports betting will affect this game unless one of the key players goes out past curfew, gets wasted, and then lays a bundle on the opposing team(JK of course). I don't think weather will effect this game either. Not sure about the field though. It is grass and may be saturated.

I like the emotional side of this for Hawaii. The players love their new HC, 100 of them doing the Haka Dance before the game, and beginning a new season they don't see the troubles ahead. If this game was mid-season, in Berkeley, I'd lay off or bet Cal at 20 points, but unless Cal plays all out at mid-season form for 60 minutes, I don't see them covering. A win will suffice.

 

[blackchina]

Good luck. Just so you know it's sunny and no rain in sight. It will be 15 degrees Celsius come game time Saturday

 

[MackDonald]

Rumor has it, the Aussie women like to fornicate excessively at this time of the year (cooler weather)...."When the Frost is on the Pumpkin, it's Time for Peter Dunkin". Our American boys better be on their guard.

 

[sendacash]

Interesting article on how Cal is handling the long trip:

College football's Kickoff Week begins in earnest next week, but the season's first college football game comes on Friday night (ESPN/WatchESPN, 10 p.m. ET).
In Australia.
Huh?
California and Hawaii will kick off the 2016 season live at noon local time in Australia, 17 hours ahead of America's West Coast -- and 20 hours ahead of Hawaiian time.
"It'll be a unique experience for sure," Cal coach Sonny Dykes said. "Everything is an unknown."
The Sydney College Football Cup will be the first college football game played in Australia since 1987, when BYU defeated Colorado State in Melbourne. The game was organized by Destination NSW (New South Wales), the government agency for promoting tourism and events in that region of Australia.
The country's goal is to attract an NFL game to Sydney in the future. Cal and Hawaii -- two of the geographically closest teams to Australia -- found ways to fit the game into their schedule a week ahead of college football's official Kickoff Week.
There will be college bands, hot dogs and even a kiss cam at the game, one which Cal athletic director Mike Williams said will amass a profit for his university that's over "seven figures." The game is expected to yield more than a typical home game against a lower-level opponent -- even after all travel expenses are tallied.
But what about the logistics involved in transporting a major college football team from the Bay Area to Australia?
As the designated "home" team, Cal is responsible for all necessary equipment in Australia, so everything on the field at Sydney's ANZ Stadium -- originally built to host the 2000 Summer Olympics -- will represent the fruit of eight months of intense planning and preparation.
The Bears sent scouts to Australia in February to appraise the complexity of the challenge.
Shipping thousands of pounds of football equipment 7,432 miles isn't simple. Much of it arrived in the cargo hold of the Boeing 777 charter that was provided to Cal at a discounted rate by Virgin Australia founder Richard Branson. Some larger items -- such as practice-field goalposts -- made the trip by boat in June.
Then came the hurdle of obtaining passports for 75 of the Bears' 105 players.
"That was a nightmare," Dykes said.
Finally, the flight itself -- an epic trek from San Francisco International Airport to Sydney that lasted 15½ hours -- required its own special preparation.
Following an intentionally draining double-practice day meant to induce immediate sleep on the flight, Cal took off Saturday at 11:30 p.m. Pacific Time, with business-class seats reserved for the team's linemen.

Complete with cheerleaders and marching band, Cal is doing its best to bring college football pageantry to Australia for Kickoff Week. Rick Rycroft/AP PhotoCal's plane crossed the International Date Line, so it landed in Sydney at 7:30 a.m. local time Monday, meaning that Sunday essentially disappeared for the Bears.
Coaches awoke players about seven hours into the journey to simulate a standard Sunday morning routine, which featured yoga and light jogging aboard the plane. The team wore compression pants to stimulate blood flow, and players ate four full meals and hourly snacks during the flight to stay energized.
"We used every tool at our disposable to make sure the guys arrived fresh," Dykes said.
The Bears' buses went straight from Sydney Airport to the practice field, where former Cal great Marshawn Lynch made an appearance and coaches began administering a full day of work -- one designed to keep players up until nighttime so that they would rise on Tuesday already acclimated to the 17-hour time difference.
Fun and games followed. The staff booked a climb of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, reserved time for players wanting to check out the famous Opera House and organized two beach trips. Dykes said that he was planning to surf in Australia.
"When you have an opportunity as an 18-year-old to go across the world to a different continent, to see a completely different culture, and to explore a place you might have never have an opportunity to explore, just the impact that can have on your life is great," Dykes said. "It's something you can't put a value on."
The actual game that will conclude this weeklong trip will continue with the theme of novelty. It'll be the first game for new Hawaii coach Nick Rolovich, and Cal will break in new quarterback Davis Webb. The unfamiliarity, though, will have begun several months before kickoff, when Cal first embarked on the challenge of hosting a game on the opposite side of the world from Berkeley.

 

[clowncar]

Rumor has it, the Aussie women like to fornicate excessively at this time of the year (cooler weather)...."When the Frost is on the Pumpkin, it's Time for Peter Dunkin". Our American boys better be on their guard.

Australian women are pretty nice looking, seem intelligent and seem sporting to adventure. shrug. Let the guard down

 

[ofred]

Loose women, low drinking age…how can these poor boys concentrate on football?

 

[blackchina]

Loose women, low drinking age…how can these poor boys concentrate on football?

it will make them play better

 

[rickrock]

Hi Fred,

The other side, Cal, would be the degenerate play. Rolovich is a Warrior icon and his players will be ready to play. I actually caught +22.5 5 weeks ago and middled a bit back at 20. Cal is missing so much....I fully expect SDSt to beat this on 9/10.

 

[bobbyjones2]

gl w the play fred..i too, think the warriors keep this thing very respectful

 

[LSUpete]

Interesting take on Hawaii.....good luck. I personally like to wager on the team with the better QB and coach, so I'll be on Cal tonight -20.

 

[MGMan]

how about the over? That's my play.

 

[ofred]

A push, go figure. Still 0-0. Cal's defense was not good, but Webb looked great considering these were all new receivers. Cal could be an "over" type team this year. The books must have hated it considering some shops were at -19.5 and some were at -20.5…..so those that shopped got a win.