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2007 Tostitos Bowl BCS Championship Game Preview and Pick: Florida vs. Ohio State ]]> include($base_url . “/includes/header.htm”); ?>
| Florida Gators (12-1) +7, o/u 46 vs. Ohio State Buckeyes (12-0) on Monday, January 8, 2007 at 8:00 p.m. Eastern on Fox by Ultimatecapper.com Staff The 2006 College football season concludes with this great matchup with the Florida Gators facing the Ohio State Buckeyes for the National Championship. Ohio State comes in as a clearcut favorite while Florida comes in under much controversy. There were many people who thought that Michigan was more worthy of a rematch than Florida. Ohio State is looking for their 2nd National Championship under Head Coach Jim Tressel. Florida is trying to put 2nd year coach Urban Meyer in the record books for taking over a team and winning a National Championship in 2 years. The Gators, 1st place in the SEC, will be playing in their 16thbowl consecutive bowl game. They have lost 3 of their last 4 bowlgames but did win last year under Head Coach Urban Meyer. CLICKHERE TO BET ON THIS GAME USING YOUR CHECKING ACCOUNT! The Buckeyes, 1st in the Big 10 Conference, will be playing in their 7th consecutive bowl game. They are currently on a 4 game bowl winning streak. The last time these teams have no recent matchups and did not face any common opponents this year. Florida was 4-8 against the spread this season. Ohio State was 9-3 against the number this year. The Gators are led by two pronged QB attack. Senior QB Chris Leak runs the passing game with a completion rate of 62.9%, 2,729 yards, 22 Tds and 13 interceptions. When they turn to the running game they turn to Freshman Tim Tebow who has added 7 rushing TDs and 4 passing TDs. The Buckeyes are led by the Heisman Trophy winning Senior QB Troy Smith who has a 67.0% completion rate and has thrown for 2,507 yards this season. He has 30 touchdowns and has thrown 5 interceptions. Florida averages 160 yards rushing per game and their defense allows 74 yards rushing per game. Ohio State is outrushing their opponents by a margin of 180-93. The Gators rank 32nd in scoring offense in Division 1 (out of 119 teams) by averaging 28.8 points per game. Ohio State is ranked 7th in scoring offense by averaging 36.3 points per game. Florida is ranked 21st in total yards per game with 398.1 yards per game. Ohio State is ranked 15th with an average of 409.8 yards per game. The Gators defense is ranked 6th giving up an average 13.5 points per game. The Buckeyes’ defense is ranked 2nd giving up an average 10.4 points per game. Florida’s defense is ranked 10th in total yards by giving up an average of 268.8 yards per game. Ohio State is ranked 13th giving up 273.0 yards per game. Florida averages 6.5 yards per play while giving up an average of 4.4 yards per play. Ohio State averages 6.3 YPP while giving up 4.6 YPP. The Over/Under is 4-8 in Florida games this season, 3-9 in Ohio State games. The Sagarin PREDICTOR ratings at USAToday.com rank the Gators #6 at 91.64. Ohio State ranks #1 at 100.52. The opening line on this game at most sportbooks was Ohio State -7.5 with a total of 48.5. The line has moved down to Ohio State -7 and the total has dropped to 46 indicating that sharp bettors are seeing some decent value in the Gators. At the time of this writing the betting public was backing Ohio State by a margin of 60%-40%. The Ultimatecapper Prediction: In examining the stats for this game it would appear that these teams are pretty well matched in talent. When looking at the yards per play, Florida actually has a slight advantage. We think this game is pretty much a toss up and support a play on the Gators plus the points. Ohio State 21 Florida 20 |
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