This is not gambling advice. But if you’re curious how others are picking this weekend, we’ve got you covered. Your friendly neighborhood Tennessee blogger and a cadre of this site’s biggest supporters were given a pool of about 36 games and asked to pick 10 of them. Below are the CFAJ Crew’s picks for Week 1, sorted by how much agreement there was among the picks.
Consensus Picks
High Confidence—these are games that a large chunk of the crew picked the same way.
Alabama -30.5 vs. Western Kentucky: Nine out of 10 pickers chose this game and all of them picked the Tide to cover a hefty four-TD-plus spread. Looks like a bellwether game for the CFAJ crew, if the Hilltoppers beat the spread, we might all be idiots.
Medium-Low Confidence—just a handful of the panel picked these games at all, but they all picked the same way.
TCU -9.5 at Stanford: Four pickers like the Horned Frogs to cover on the road against the Cardinal.
Michigan -20.5 vs. Fresno State: Only three of the crew picked this game, but they all picked the defending National Champions to cover.
Akron +50.5 at Ohio State: Three of the crew picked the Zips to keep it within half a hundy in the Horseshoe (50 points is a helluva lot of points).
James Madison -8.5 at Charlotte and Arizona State -6.5 vs. Wyoming also had three pickers each.
80% Club
These three games were nearly unanimous, but each had one contrarian pick:
UGA -13.5 vs. Clemson: Seven of the crew took the Dawgs, with one lone picker choosing Dabo and the Tigers. For myself, I think Carson Beck is a two-TD better QB than Cade Klubnik, and that settled the pick for me.
Virginia Tech -14.5 at Vanderbilt: Another 7-1 pick in favor of the Hokies. Is this UT-centric anti-Vandy bias? Probably. Is it wrong? Probably not.
South Carolina -19.5 vs. Old Dominion: One lone picker chose the Monarchs while five took the hometown Gamecocks.
Split Decisions
These games were the most contentious, with a near-even split among the pickers who chose them.
Miami (FL) -2.5 at Florida: Five of the the eight pickers who chose this game are expecting the visiting Hurricanes to drain the Swamp.
Penn State -10.5 vs. West Virginia: A three-two split in favor of the Nittany Lions is the closest contest in Week 1 for this group.
Notre Dame +2.5 at Texas A&M: Only two of six pickers expect the Aggies to defend Kyle Field against the Irish in the Preseason Expectations Bowl.
LSU -5.5 vs. USC: Seven picks came in for this game, with five on the side of LSU.
The following games had a 2-1 split, with two pickers choosing the first team listed in each pair:
UNC +2.5 at Minnesota
Nebraska -27.5 vs. UTEP
Houston -1.5 vs. UNLV
Georgia Tech -20.5 vs. Georgia State
One-Off’s
These games were only picked by one (or two) pickers:
Coastal Carolina -11.5 at Jacksonville St.
Oklahoma -41.5 vs. Temple
Michigan St. -11.5 (two pickers) vs. Florida Atlantic
Wisconsin -23.5 vs. Western Michigan
Texas -35.5 vs. Colorado St.
FIU +20.5 at Indiana
Northwestern -3.5 vs. Miami-Ohio
Boise State -12.5 vs. Georgia Southern
UCLA -13.5 (two pickers) at Hawaii
Arizona -30.5 (two pickers) vs. New Mexico
Boston College +21.5 (two pickers) at Florida State
Which picks do you agree with? Disagree with? Let us know: