Ohio @ Northern Illinois 11/24/2015

I recommended a 1% play on the Over 56 when the line opened. NIU wins their side of the conference with a victory over Ohio tonight. Ohio, for their part, will be hungry for an upset to to finish out their resurgent end of season. It looks like the Bobcats may have finally settled on JD Sprague as their starting quarterback. It only took most of the season for them to figure that out...assuming he is the guy who plays most of the game tonight, lol. He's proven to be a better runner and a better downfield passer than Vick. Ohio resurrected a dead running game after their week 9 bye. As a team they had failed to reach 200 yards of rushing in a game since weeks 1 and 2. Since the by they've averaged over 300 yards rushing per game, while still throwing for over 200 yards per game as well. My lines incorporate the in-season trends, but I think my line is still under-valuing where the Ohio run game is right now. It wouldn't surprise me to see them hang around within a score for most of this game. Unfortunately for Ohio, and why they should lose this game tonight, is that their injury-ravaged defense wasn't involved in the bye week resurrection. Outside of a game against the offense-less Kent they've let their opponents gain more than their usual yards per play averages, especially against the run, which is especially bad against NIU. Ohio-Ball St. was a higher-scoring game than TOL-BGSU last week. While I don't think tonight's Ohio game will be higher scoring than the BGSU game again, I do think it provides better value on the Over.