BetIQ Daily: College Bowl Game Picks on New Mexico, LendingTree, and New Orleans Bowls

Picks for Friday and Saturday include three bowl game picks on a full Saturday, involving the New Mexico, LendingTree, and New Orleans Bowls.

December 17, 2021 - by Jason Lisk

Fresno State will try to score points on Saturday (Douglas Stringer/Icon Sportswire)

Friday, December 17 (#20)

BetIQ Daily is here for the launch of the bowl extravaganza, where we have eight different FBS bowl games (plus the Celebration Bowl between Jackson State and South Carolina State) in the next two days. We also have the Patriots vs. Colts NFL game on Saturday.

This post highlights a sample of picks available to subscribers, which also include college basketball and NBA picks.

See all picks by subscribing or using our free one-year subscription offer from BetMGM.

3 Saturday Picks

1) Marshall +4 (vs. Louisiana) – Bowl Spread Pick

Saturday, 9:15 p.m. ET in New Orleans (New Orleans Bowl)
Playable spread pick according our Ensemble Forecast, Decision Tree, and Predictive Rating models.
Louisiana head coach Billy Napier left to take the Florida job.
Louisiana is tied for second-most popular spread pick in bowl pools, despite line moving against that popularity (opened -5.5).
Marshall coming off blowout 53-21 loss to Western Kentucky with Conference USA title game appearance on line.
QB Grant Wells left that game due to injury in second quarter with Marshall leading, but he’s back for the bowl game.

2) UTEP/Fresno State Over 51.5 Points – Bowl Over/Under Pick

Saturday, 2:15 p.m. ET in Albuquerque, NM (New Mexico Bowl)
This is a trends pick based on likelihood of an over at colder-weather bowl venues.
High on Saturday in Albuquerque is 45 degrees.
The over has hit in eight of 13 bowl games in Albuquerque, including seven of 10 when host New Mexico is not involved and playing at home.

3) Eastern Michigan-Liberty Under 58.0 Points – Bowl Over/Under Pick

Saturday, 5:45 p.m. ET in Mobile, AL (LendingTree Bowl)
One of our five highest-rated bowl over/under plays, according to our Ensemble Forecast model.
Liberty is No. 12 in both yards per game allowed and yards allowed per play.
Eastern Michigan is in bottom 25 in yards per carry, while Liberty is in the top 25 in yards per carry allowed.
Both teams rank outside the top 100 in sacks taken on offense.

We’ve already listed the Patriots as one of our upset picks for this week, so we won’t double dip here, but check our thoughts on the Patriots to win outright there. We also had a pick related to the Browns-Raiders games but will move that to Monday’s article with that game being postponed.

What Else We Are Watching on Friday/Saturday

The bowl games start today with the Bahamas Bowl and Cure Bowl. Here are some other games to watch (our predictive ranking in parentheses):

Bowl Games

Coastal Carolina (47) vs. Northern Illinois (97), Friday, 6 p.m. ET (ESPN)
Western Kentucky (53) vs. Appalachian State (36), Saturday, 11 a.m. ET (ESPN)
BYU (41) vs. UAB (67), Saturday, 3:30 p.m. ET (ABC)
Oregon State (44) vs. Utah State (84), Saturday, 7:30 p.m. ET (ABC)

College Basketball

St. Bonaventure (50) vs. Virginia Tech (28), Friday, 4 p.m. ET in Charlotte (ESPN2)
Memphis (29) vs. Tennessee (9), Saturday, 12 p.m. ET in Nashville (ESPN)
Gonzaga (2) vs. Texas Tech (22), Saturday, 1 p.m. ET in Phoenix (CBS)
North Carolina (32) vs. Kentucky (23), Saturday, 5:30 p.m. ET in Las Vegas (CBS)
Baylor (4) at Oregon (48), Saturday, 10 p.m. ET (ESPN2)

QB Passing Projections Note

We will include the passing projections in the Sunday picks article. At publication time, fewer than half of the games have posted lines so far because of the uncertainty entering the weekend.

Bowl Betting Articles

We’ve also been churning out bowl betting articles this week. You can see the following:

And if you are in a bowl pool contest, check out our College Bowl Pool Picks.

Top Pick Performance Trends

Our algorithmic models use over a decade of data to predict every game across five sports.

As of post time, here are some highlights of prediction performance from our primary Ensemble Forecast model this season, for playable-rated picks (52.5% confidence or better) against game-day betting lines:

NFL point spread picks: 41-30-1 (58%, +7.3 units)
College football over/under picks: 173-143-3 (55%, +14.3 units)
NBA spread picks: 13-8 (62%, +3.8 units)

To view our model predictions and picks for all sports and all games, see our subscription page.

We also have a free one-year subscription offer from BetMGM available in select betting-legal U.S. states, though some restrictions apply.

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