A Look at the Best Bets for College Football Week 4

Week 4 is when the new realities of college football slap you in the face.

Tennessee/Oklahoma is the top SEC game, Utah and Oklahoma State are battling in a key Big 12 tilt, and USC makes its first Big Ten road trip to Michigan.

It’s the new normal in college football and it’s even weirder to see Stanford/Syracuse and Cal/Florida State further down the Week 4 docket.

Anyway, here are the bets to make on Saturday.

Game of the Week: No. 6 Tennessee (-7) at No. 15 Oklahoma

It’s the SEC! In primetime! With two name-brand programs!

Tennessee and Oklahoma feel like they reside in different tiers of the SEC despite both being ranked in the Top 15.

Nico Iamaleava, who has already gained one-name status, is a burgeoning superstar at Tennessee with 698 passing yards through three games. The Vols offense has been so good that Iamaleava hasn’t played a full game yet. The Vols have won 69-3, 51-10 and 71-0.

Oklahoma struggled to put away Houston and Tulane in the last two weeks and its young quarterback, Jackson Arnold, has been picked twice and sacked nine times.

Iamaleava is the star of the show for Tennessee, but the best player is defensive lineman James Pearce, who could be the No. 1 pick in the 2025 NFL Draft. The Vols can pull away if their defense shines and Iamaleava continues to operate with remarkable precision in the pocket.

Favorite to Trust: West Virginia (-2.5) vs. Kansas

You can call this the Pandering Pick of the Week to the Kinker.

But it’s also a really good bet to make.

West Virginia came up short against Pittsburgh in the Backyard Brawl, but at least moved the ball consistently with Garrett Greene at quarterback.

The same can’t be said about Kansas, who stalled out on offense many times in the last two weeks against UNLV and Illinois because of Jalon Daniels’ poor play in the pocket.

Daniels has six interceptions and just three touchdown passes (Not Good!) and he only has a 54.9 completion percentage (Also Not Good!)

Greene’s completion percentage is only five points better than Daniels, but he hasn’t been a turnover machine with only two picks and five touchdown passes. Trust the better quarterback at home here.

Kinker: I don’t know much about Kansas this year, but we are choking dogs. Neal Brown can take his candy ass back to the Sun Belt. That being said, Joe is probably right, and we’ll win some stupid Big 12 game after collapsing against our biggest rival, but this weekend I’m putting my money into PA online casinos. Or New Jersey online casino if for some reason I end up over there.

Underdog to Back: Western Kentucky (+2.5) vs. Toledo 

All of the college sports junkies have all sorts of terms for certain spots teams fall into.

In Toledo’s case, this is the ideal let down spot after the Rockets went into Starkville and annihilated Mississippi State.

Sure, Mississippi Stat isn’t good at all, but Toledo’s been reading the press clippings that it beat an SEC team.

Western Kentucky is no slouch and its offense is comparable to Toledo’s. The Hilltoppers scored 80 points in the last two weeks after getting whooped in a buy game against Alabama.

WKU ranks 18th in the FBS in passing offense, which is typical for the program. A very strong pass attack should be the difference to cash in as an underdog.

Points! Points! Points!: Southern Miss at Jacksonville State (Over 60)

Look, I had to pander to Kinkead in order to sneak in bets on two games that no one else cares about.

Here’s the Reader’s Digest version of the breakdown: Jacksonville State gives up the fourth-most yards per game in the FBS and its allowed 55, 49 and 37 points in its first three games.

The Southern Miss defense isn’t as bad, but it did allow 31 and 49 points in its two games against FBS opponents.

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