Bet On NCAA Football – Cougars, Miners Kick Off Bowl Season

Those who bet on NCAA football have been waiting for bowl season to start, and it finally kicks off on Saturday in the New Mexico Bowl, where BYU will square off with UTEP, who are back in the bowls for the first time since 2005.

BYU UTEP Betting – Saturday, 2:00 PM ET

The Cougars (6-6, 5-3) finished fifth in the Mountain West, and this is their last game as a member of the MWC as they will be independent next season. BYU struggled out of the gate, losing five of their last seven culminating with a 31-3 road romp at the hands of TCU, but they turned it around thanks to a four-game winning streak, and they lost by a single point to Utah in the “Holy War”. Some online horse betting players will say that a jockey change can inspire a horse, and a quarterback change definitely sparked the Cougars as freshman Jake Heaps stepped in and gave BYU some hope for the future. BYU was uncharacteristically low in the passing ranks, coming in 86^th through the air, but Heaps played extremely well down the stretch.

The Miners (6-6, 3-5) came in fourth in the West division of Conference-USA, and their year went the opposite direction of the bowl opponents. UTEP won five of their first six games, but it all went downhill in the second half of the season as they dropped five of their last six, including all four of their games on the road. UTEP’s strength was actually their special teams as they were 10^th nationally in kickoff returns and 11^th in punt returns, led by Marlon McClure. However, the Miners were 72^nd offensively and 86^th defensively, and they should just be happy to be back in the bowls after a five-year absence.

Betting services have the Cougars as an 11.5-point favorite in New Mexico, and both teams will be playing for the first time in the fifth edition of this bowl game. BYU may just be happy to play somewhere other than Las Vegas, where they have played in the postseason for the last five years. These two have a history together as they were in the WAC, but it has been rather one-sided as the Cougars have won 25 of their last 27 meetings against the Miners, the last of which came in 1998. We think this game will be a preview of things to come as Heaps will lead an aerial attack on the Miners to give BYU their fourth win in five bowl games, and the Cougars will continue their dominance over an old conference foe. Take BYU to cover the sports betting spread.