Owls vs Bulldogs Gambling Odds
The Rice Owls will look to continue their historic season. After winning their first outright conference title in 56 years, the Owls will now look for a school best 11th win.
Rice Owls (10-3) vs Mississippi State Bulldogs (6-6)
When: Tuesday, December 31st, 2013, 4:00 PM ET
Where: Liberty Bowl, Memphis, Tennessee
Broadcast: ESPN
Spread: Mississippi State -7
O/U: 50.5
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The Mississippi State Bulldogs will be looking for the 4th consecutive winning season.
The Liberty Bowl is one of the older bowl games. It hasn’t always taken place in Memphis, Tennessee, though. From 1959 to 1963 the game took place in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1964, the Liberty Bowl took place in Atlantic City, New Jersey which was the first bowl game to take place indoors.
From 1965 to now it has taken place in Memphis, Tennessee.
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Mississippi State is no stranger to the Liberty Bowl. The Bulldogs have been here a handful of times with the most recent coming in 2007. For the Rice Owls, however, this will be their first appearance in the Liberty Bowl.
The Rice Owls aren’t well known, obviously, but they have a couple of studs on their team. Charles Ross their star back, a big bruising back that runs with a lot of purpose. Ross rushed for 1252 yards and 14 rushing touchdowns for the season.
As a team, Rice ran for 240 yards a game this season, but, going up against an SEC defense will prove to be difficult and it will be interesting to see if Rice can establish their running game and get Ross going.
This is a Mississippi State team that held Ole Miss to 10 points, Alabama to 20 points, Auburn to 24 points, and even Oklahoma State to 21 points. For the most part, it’s tough to score on the Bulldogs and it’ll be interesting to see if the 10 win Rice Owls can score and compete with the Bulldogs.
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On the offensive side for the Bulldogs, they weren’t very impressive. They only scored 26.3 points a game and don’t really have any players that statistically jump out. But, they do have a lot of talent. The duel threat quarterback Dak Prescott has a lot of talent. A lot of speed and it may be tough for Rice to contain him.
Danny’s FREE College Football Pick:
Overall, this game all boils down to the size and talent of Mississippi State. The Bulldogs have the better athletes being in the SEC and they are much bigger than the Rice Owls. The Bulldogs should have no problems pushing around Rice and I believe Mississippi State at -7 and the under at 50.5 are the two best picks.
I don’t think Rice will be able to move the ball on a good SEC defense in Mississippi State and I don’t believe they will score many points.
I believe the Bulldogs will score their fair share of points, but it takes two to tango for a point total to get over and I don’t think this game will go over.
So, all in all, I like the under at 50.5 and I like Mississippi State to cover the 7 points.
Pick: Under 50.5, Mississippi State -7
Prediction: Mississippi State 31 – Rice Owls 13
