College football betting line handicappers are eagerly anticipating the Red River Rivalry showdown from Dallas between #21 Texas and #8 Oklahoma. Kickoff Saturday is set for 3:35 PM Eastern and Sbgglobal opened with Oklahoma as a 3.5 point favorite. ABC will telecast the game.
Shocking Setback
The Texas Longhorns will have to quickly recover from their shocking loss last week to unranked and lightly regarded UCLA 34-12 in which they were 15.5 point home favorites. What was most stunning about the defeat was that the Longhorns were manhandled and mauled by UCLA as the Bruins bulldozed their way through the vaunted Texas defense for a whopping 264 yards on the ground. Texas looked helpless and pathetic in the loss and fell to 3-1 straight up and 1-3 with the college football lines this year.
Offensive Woes
Not only did the Longhorns find that their defense is not nearly as good as advertised but they have continued to struggle on offense and rank an embarrassing 77th in the country for offensive output. New starting quarterback Garrett Gilbert has been inconsistent and has a rather weak 6.4 yards per attempt average with a 4/4 touchdown/interception ratio. A breakaway receiver is yet to emerge and the ground game remains as unreliable as ever.
Broken Bullies
For a program that is used to having its way and running the Big 12 Conference with an Iron Fist this is not the way the Longhorns are used to living and head coach Mack Brown will be under fire soon if they don’t improve.
Sloppy Sooners
The Oklahoma Sooners have a record of 4-0 straight up but just 1-3 with the college football betting line. Oklahoma does just enough to win and nothing more as their only impressive performance this year was in week 2 when the destroyed then ranked Florida State 47-17 as 7 point home favorites. Last week OU opened up a 24-9 lead on the road against Cincinnati before having to hold on for a 31-29 win in which they failed to cover as 14 point favorites.
Trends
Head coach Bob Stoops and Oklahoma once dominated this series but Brown and Texas have turned the tables in recent years with the college football lines as OU has failed to cover the last 5 meetings in the series. But after last week’s disgraceful UT performance OU may be ready to regain command of the Red River Rivalry.