College football bowl betting: Odds and more for 5 bowls before Christmas – SB Nation
Mark Zerof-USA TODAY Sports
Marshall vs. Northern Illinois highlights a group of bowls taking place early this week.
The BYU Cougars and Memphis Tigers meet in the Miami Beach Bowl at 2 p.m. ET on Monday, Dec. 22. Allowing only 17.1 points per game on defense this season, Memphis finished the year ranked fifth behind only Ole Miss, Stanford, LSU and Alabama in scoring defense.
BYU is 4-1 straight up and against the spread in its last five bowl games, while Memphis will be making its first bowl appearance since 2008. The Tigers are a 2-point favorite.
The Marshall Thundering Herd hope to prove that they aren’t just the product of a soft schedule when they take on the Northern Illinois Huskies in the Boca Raton Bowl at 6 p.m. ET on Tuesday, Dec. 23.
The Thundering Herd finished the regular season with a 12-1 SU and 7-5-1 ATS record and are one of the biggest bowl favorites of the season as a 10-point favorite in the Boca Raton Bowl, according to sportsbooks monitored by OddsShark.com.
Marshall is 7-1 ATS over its last eight bowl appearances, but Northern Illinois won’t be a pushover coming off an 11-2 SU and 7-6 ATS season of its own.
At 9:30 p.m. ET on Tuesday, Dec. 23, the Navy Midshipmen and San Diego State Aztecs clash in the Poinsettia Bowl in San Diego. The UNDER is 9-5 over Navy’s last 14 games and 11-1 over San Diego’s last 12, setting the stage for a potentially low-scoring game.
San Diego State is listed at -2.5 and the total is set at 54 points on the college bowl game betting lines.
Central Michigan vs. Western Kentucky kicks off at noon ET on Wednesday, Dec. 24 in the Bahamas Bowl. These two teams met in the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl in 2012, and Central Michigan came out on top, 24-21, as a 6.5-point underdog. CMU is the underdog again this week going off at +3 in Nassau.
The Fresno State Bulldogs will be looking to break out of an 0-5 SU and ATS bowl slump when they face the Rice Owls in the Hawaii Bowl at 8 p.m. ET on Wednesday, Dec. 24. Rice enters the game as a 2.5-point underdog after finishing the season on a 7-2 ATS run to go 7-5 SU and 8-4 ATS on the season.
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