Bettors have no faith in the Iowa and Minnesota offenses. Again.
The point total for Saturday's game between the Gophers and Hawkeyes has dropped to 30.5 at BetMGM. If that number holds or goes down before kickoff, it'll be the lowest over/under for any college football game in 20 years.
Last year’s game between the two rivals tied the lowest over/under since 2003 when it closed at 31.5. And sure enough, the teams combined to hit the under. Iowa beat Minnesota 13-10.
Iowa is in the driver’s seat for the Big Ten West after a 15-6 win at Wisconsin in Week 7. The line for that game closed at 33.5 points.
Last week's game was just the ninth game since 2003 to close with a total under 35 points according to TeamRankings.com. And the six games with totals of 34 or lower in the last 20 years have gone under five times.
There’s a very good reason why this year’s total for Iowa and Minnesota is lower than it was a season ago. Iowa QB Cade McNamara is out for the year with a torn ACL and the team lost leading receiver TE Erick All to a torn ACL in the Wisconsin game. All has 21 catches so far this year. No other Iowa player has more than 10 — and one of those players with 10 catches is TE Luke Lachey. He suffered a season-ending injury in the third game of the season.
Deacon Hill has started in McNamara’s place and is completing 39% of his passes and averaging 4.4 yards an attempt. Hill is just 27-of-70 passing for 311 yards.
McNamara and Hill have combined to throw for 816 yards across seven games while Minnesota QB Athan Kaliakmanis has thrown for 797 yards in six games. Each team has just six passing touchdowns and a leading rusher who averages more yards per carry than the QB averages yards per pass.
Throw in an Iowa defense that’s giving up 15 points per game and 4.3 yards per play and there are a lot of obvious reasons why bettors have pushed the total down since it was put on the board Sunday. The total opened between 32.5 and 34.5 at various sportsbooks and has settled at either 30.5 or 31.
If the line goes down further, the over could end up being a decent bet. The two offenses are combining to average nearly three turnovers a game and a defensive touchdown or special teams touchdown is very much in play. And if Iowa gets a TD from another unit, offensive coordinator Brian Ferentz will be very happy.
