
By Scott L. - SL Sports Staff
A lot of people, including many so-called gambling experts and analysts, touted Ohio State as nearly a lock as 8.5 or 9-point favorites against Notre Dame in the College Football Playoff Championship Monday night. There was even one who proposed taking the Buckeyes at -8.5 while also betting on them at an alternate spread of -23.5.
Most observers felt that Ohio State was vastly more talented and a lock to win the game. While OSU certainly paid for a more talented roster than the Irish did, there are no locks in sports. We’ve written that many times.
Even at 31-7 in the second half, the game was not over; neither the money line nor the spread were guarantees at that point. Notre Dame is a well-coached and gritty squad that wasn’t going to go down without a fight.
In fact, if the Irish hadn’t started with an ultra-conservative approach that led to a long opening-drive touchdown but also may have gassed its quarterback and offensive line, the game’s outcome may have been different.
It’s rare that underdog teams beat large favorites with a conservative approach. That’s because it’s nearly impossible for the side with less talent and depth to continue dominating the line of scrimmage for an extended period as the opponent keeps rotating in fresh four- and five-star recruits.
This is true at all levels, not just college.
Look at the Washington Commanders, who have thrown caution to the wind and gone for it on almost every fourth down in their first two NFL playoff games and are now one win away from the Super Bowl. Even when head coach Dan Quinn made the right decision late in Washington’s second-round win at Detroit, attempting a field goal that would have put his team up by three scores with a few minutes left, his kicker left the door cracked by missing indoors from just 44 yards.
You can’t win by playing scared or playing not to lose – not when you’re a big underdog, anyway.
Notre Dame came out firing after falling behind by 24 and made a game of it. In fact, the Irish made more than a game of it. They were one third-and-long stop from getting the ball back in the final 3 minutes while trailing by just a single score, but for some reason they went with man-to-man against a wideout who probably could play in the NFL right now and got beaten for a long gain on a deep pass.
So, the heavily favored eventual national champions realized that being conservative in that moment probably made their situation more perilous than playing for the win right then and there.
That’s what champions do; they play to win.
Up until that point, however, it looked like the Buckeyes probably would not cover the spread. It took a perfect throw on a risky play call go put them in a position to cover. But even then the sweat was not over. Some quick math indicated that Ohio State could run the clock down and kick a short field goal to put the championship on ice, but it wasn’t a done deal.
Young athletes make mistakes. Coaches make mistakes. The Buckeyes could have scored on an explosive running play. And a fumble always is a possibility when the ball is being handed to another player. And for Notre Dame bettors, the ending was like suffering through a slow death. There still was a sliver of hope, but a bet that seemed likely to win just moments earlier was now almost sure to lose.
That is the roller-coaster that almost all sports gamblers ride. If we dissect the game a little further, though, the outcome could have been much different – for those with money riding on it at least.
After opening the offense up and allowing his team to compete most of the second half, Notre Dame coach Marcus Freeman chose to kick what should have been an easy field goal down by 16 on fourth and goal from inside the 10-yard line. He did this with fewer than 10 minutes remaining.
It really made no sense to kick and cut the margin from 16 to 13, since two touchdowns would have been needed to give Notre Dame a chance to win either way. Executing two touchdown drives in the final 9-plus minutes would have been nearly impossible against a strong defense such as Ohio State’s, so if you’re nine yards away with a chance to throw it into the end zone and get within one score, it seems like the odds are much higher of that being successful than giving the ball back to the Buckeyes with a 13-point lead.
“I just thought instead of being down 16, let’s try and go down 13,” Freeman told reporters after the game. “I know it’s still a two-score game, but you have a better probability of getting 14 points than you do 16 points. If it was a shorter fourth-and-goal situation, I probably would have gone for it, but I just felt that fourth-and-9 was not a great chance for us to make that.”
Well, as it turns out, the Irish missed the field goal, so the decision looked even more questionable than it already was. Remember, nothing is a given and young athletes make mistakes. That was followed by Freeman’s decision to blitz and play man coverage against one of the nation’s top receivers on what turned out to be the game’s deciding play.
These are the things we simply can’t quantify in our handicaps. None of us can. Sure, there are some coaches who are terrible at in-game decision making, which is something that can be taken into consideration, but Freeman is a widely respected coach who had done a great job with his team to bring them back from a terrible early season loss to Northern Illinois all the way to the championship game.
Opportunities to play for championships are extremely hard to come by, so no one could have predicted that Freeman would go back and forth between an ultra-conservative approach and throwing caution to the wind. He opened his offense up and allowed his team to get back in the game then went conservative with the field-goal attempt before the risky decision to play man-to-man while blitzing.
With coaches and officials, as gamblers all that we ask for is consistency.
Consistency is what we strive for, too. When we analyze games using our proprietary algorithm, we focus solely on maximizing our clients’ odds of winning bets regularly. We aren’t worried about getting the best odds to maximize our return on one single bet, but instead we are focused on winning incrementally over time to ensure the highest probability of a long-term return on investment that can make a difference in people’s lives.
That’s why we often recommend money-line bets with shorter odds than what some others might choose. And while many gamblers cringe when they see odds of -190 or -200 or even -250, the reality is that most gamblers lose more often than they win. A lot more often.
And while maybe there is a thrill or rush to winning a plus-money bet or hitting a big parlay with very long odds, it’s simply not a formula for long-term success. Those types of bets produce frequent losses that compound themselves over time, whereas our incremental wins allow our clients to supplement their income and keep betting without jeopardizing their financial standing.
Our approach has proven over two decades to win consistently at a rate providing a yearly ROI that generally exceeds most other investment options currently provide. That’s how we have built our reputation, why our long-term customers remain loyal and why our newer customers are blown away by the results.
We stay true to ourselves and are consistent in our approach.
Our recommended pick for last night’s game was a teaser or same-game parlay, pairing Notre Dame to cover a line of 14.5 points with a total of over 39.5 points scored. Parlays aren’t something we recommend often, but when we do it’s because we have evaluated every possible option and determined that to be the best way to maximize the odds of winning.
Sure, it would have been easy to pair the total with Ohio State on the money line, but Notre Dame has a tremendous defense, which usually is the biggest factor if an inferior team pulls off a big upset. Based on the numerous statistical categories our model analyzes, the matchup was close enough to be concerned about a potential upset, meaning that the Irish were very likely to keep the game close enough to stay within two touchdowns. Given OSU’s offensive prowess, it also stood to reason that Notre Dame would have to score a few points to make that outcome happen. If the bookmakers and market agreed upon 45.5 as a reasonable game total and we had the Irish staying within two TDs, the bet of over 39.5 points looked even better than the alternate spread bet.
A correlative approach is the only way to be successful when betting parlays or teasers.
Still, despite our long-term record of success and our willingness only to recommend the picks about which we are most confident, last night’s result turned out to be a sweat for us, too. We had the over covered early, though, which made us feel even more confident, and frankly with a little better coaching on the part of the Freeman, it probably wouldn’t have been much of a sweat at all.
But that’s just more proof that you can’t handicap everything and more evidence as to why it’s important to take a consistent approach that focuses on long-term results over hitting the home run every time.
Less sweat. Less stress. Better returns.
That’s what we do.
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