The TCU Horned Frogs and the Michigan State Spartans are set to kick off the 2012 Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl on Saturday 12/29, and I’m set to make my Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl pick for the affair at Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, AZ. Kickoff is set for 10:15 ET, and I’ve got the perfect NCAA football pick for the Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl.
2012 Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl
TCU Horned Frogs (7-5, 5-7 ATS) -2
Michigan State Spartans (6-6, 4-8 ATS) +2
Over/Under 40.5
I’m going to start off by saying that teasing anything in this game is probably a great idea, though I think that I would stick with Michigan State with either side of this ‘total’. The ‘over’ is probably the safer call, as it is tough to envision most any bowl game not getting to at least 34 points, but in the end, I think that a straight play for the game is better suited playing the ‘under’ than anything else, as these two defenses are just flat out nasty.
The Horned Frogs have had some problems this year, but those problems have come against teams with some truly elite offenses in the Big XII. Throw out middle of the season games against Baylor, Texas Tech, Oklahoma State, and West Virginia, all of which have out of this world offenses, and what’s left are eight games with just 15.8 points per game allowed. The club ranked 18th in the land in total defense at 332.0 yards per game, a number that was well under 280 yards when you take away those four previously mentioned outings, and was 10th in the land in rush defense at 103.9 yards per game. I also want to point out that QB Trevone Boykin, in spite of his respectable year, is still nothing more than a backup quarterback that really isn’t ready to play at this level in my eyes on a regular basis.
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I’m going to call QB Andrew Maxwell for what he truly was this year: Terrible. He had a ton of pomp and circumstance for his arrival as a starter with QB Kirk Cousins now playing in the NFL, but he completed just 52.9 percent of his passes, averaged 6.0 yards per pass attempt, and had almost as many picks (9) as he did TDs (13). That just doesn’t cut it when push comes to shove. The only thing that kept MSU in games this year was its defense, which held every single team to 28 points or fewer on the campaign. Odds have it, TCU is going to be another one of these teams that gets stuck in the low- to mid-teens when push comes to shove, and if that turns out to be the case, it’s tough to see the Buffalo Wild Wings spread reaching the ‘total’.
TCU vs. Michigan State Picks & Tips: Under 40.5
