Tennessee football vs. Bowling Green: Betting Odds and prediction for NCAA Week 1 Thursday game
On Thursday, Tennessee football will open the 2021 season at home against the Bowling Green Falcons. This is the second meeting ever between the two schools and first since they opened the 2015 season, when UT beat BGSU 59-30 in Nashville.
The Vols are coming off a 3-7 season. Their last outing, back on Dec. 19, 2020, ended with a 34-13 blowout loss at home to the Texas A&M Aggies. Since then, they have fired Jermey Pruitt, been placed under an NCAA investigation that hasn’t ended, hired a new athletic director in Danny White and a new head coach in Josh Heupel, and suffered a wave of transfers.
Bowling Green, meanwhile, is entering its third season under head coach Scot Loeffler. He went 0-5 last year and 3-9 the year before, and like Heupel, is an offensive-minded coach. However, he’s still trying to get his offense to click at his program.
Tennessee Volunteers vs. Bowling Green Falcons Week 1 Odds
On the WynnBET Week 1 betting odds, Tennessee football is a 35.5-point favorite at home. The over/under is set at 61. With Heupel coming off his worst season at UCF, this seems like a pretty large spread, but it speaks to the lack of faith the oddsmakers have in BGSU.
Tennessee Volunteers vs. Bowling Green Falcons Prediction Week 1
Is it likely that the Vols win? Yes. Will they dominate? Probably. However, Will they cover that 35.5-point spread? Not a chance.
Rocky Top hasn’t beaten an FBS team by more than 26 points since its 45-6 Outback Bowl win over the Northwestern Wildcats to close out the 2015 season. That’s actually the only game over the past 10 seasons the Vols have won by more than 35 points against an FBS team.
Now, you might think things are changing with Josh Heupel at the helm. Well, last year, Heupel didn’t win one game by 30 points are more while at UCF. Simply put, it’s almost impossible to see how the Vols cover this spread.
As for the over/under, the over is a good bet here. Anybody who saw the Vols’ spring game knows they’ll score a lot of points, and that’s even more clear with all the issues BGSU has had on defense in recent years.
Next. Ranking games on Vols' 2021 schedule by difficulty. dark
However, that also means Tennessee football’s defense has issues, which is why Bowling Green, with an offensive-minded head coach, will score enough to make this a game. Simply put, this will be an exciting matchup, but take these two bets: Bowling Green +35.5; Over 61. The final score, meanwhile, will probably look something like this: Tennessee: 52 Bowling Green: 31.