It's time to mix things up a little bit to pull out of a mid-season slump.
This week, I’m handing out a parlay that highlights one game on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The beauty of a multi-day parlay is that if you get to Saturday 2-0, you can always hedge.
So strap on your Fun Belts, prepare for a tour of the Hajj Mahal and remember that MACtion dogs are a bettor’s best friend.
So, here's my college football Group of 5 parlay for Week 7 below.
Mike Calabrese's College Football Group of 5 Week 7 Parlay
- Coastal Carolina +7.5
- UNLV Team Total Over 42.5
- Buffalo +9.5
Parlay Odds: +602 (FanDuel)
Coastal Carolina vs. James Madison Pick
There wasn’t much pomp and circumstance surrounding the hire of Tim Beck. He wasn’t a wunderkind, a coach with a long NFL track record or even some NIL savant.
Beck had been waiting patiently for a long time to be a head coach. In fact, he hadn’t been a head coach in nearly two decades before taking the top job in Conway, SC.
He was the head coach of Mansfield Summit High School, a competitive program nestled between Fort Worth and Dallas between 2002 and 2004.
After that experience, he went on an 18-year run of being a college assistant at Kansas, Nebraska, Ohio State, Texas and NC State. Many of his offenses were prolific, but that still didn’t generate a lot of hype for the 58-year-old coach.
As a college football community, I think it’s time to admit that we all whiffed on Beck. He can really coach and he has his Chants playing great football.
Despite replacing one of the best G5 coaches and losing one of the most accomplished G5 quarterbacks, Coastal is 12-6 SU under Beck’s leadership. His team is off to a 4-1 start to the season and still isn’t getting the proper respect.
Let’s start with the offense. Ethan Vasko is piloting an absurdly efficient attack. Coastal is fourth in Havoc avoidance, which is down right Service Academesque. The run-heavy system is 29th in offensive success rate, first in pass EPA and fifth among G5 teams in PFF passing grade.
In a nutshell, this is a buttoned-up offense that runs the ball a lot and spreads the love. Six runners, including Vasko, have 15 or more carries, and their top three wide receivers have nearly identical numbers. All three pop the big play, averaging 19 yards per reception as a trio.
Defensively, this is a mediocre G5 defense, but the Chants are a little bit better against the pass than the SBC average.
And while you can run up yards on Coastal, it washes away those sins by generating turnovers. The Chanticleers have nine takeaways on year, which ranks 26th. When you pair it with an offense that rarely makes mistakes, it’s natural to see them in the top 25 of turnover margin.
This game will swing on turnovers because James Madison has made its breaks with takeaways all season long. The Dukes are averaging three takeaways per game, tops in the country. But as we saw last week against UL Monroe, when teams protect the football, JMU loses its bite.
I think it’s a simple handicap here, win the turnover battle or stay within one, and the road team covers. From a strength perspective, Coastal wants to run and JMU is good — but not great — at stopping the run.
James Madison’s impressive run defense numbers have a little bit to do with game flow, as teams have abandoned the run against the Dukes. Ahmad Hardy, ULM’s star freshman ran for 82 yards and a score in an upset last week, and I think that same script will play out here in a one-possession game.
I’ll take the points, and I would advocate for buying the hook up to -135.
Leg 1: Coastal Carolina +7.5
UNLV vs. Utah State Pick
I’ve been a fan of Brennan Marion for more than 16 years, dating all the way back to his time as a player at Tulsa. He played under two visionary offensive coaches during his college playing days.
Head coach Todd Graham and offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn utilized the undersized Marion as a home run threat in the Golden Hurricane’s offense. Marion scored 19 touchdowns in two seasons while averaging a jaw-dropping 28.7 yards per reception.
Marion never got his chance to shine in the NFL due to knee injuries. But those injuries sped up his coaching timeline, handing him a whistle and headset as a 24-year-old.
He’s risen quickly in the coaching ranks, making a name for himself with the unique Go-Go Offense. The unique attack blends formational quirks, option football and the vertical passing game. You’re guaranteed to see big plays, strange formations and unique pre-snap motion every single game.
But in all of his years, he’s been searching for the perfect quarterback to run his system. Enter Hajj-Malik Williams.
The former Campbell Camel superstar lost a hard-fought quarterback battle in fall camp with Matthew Sluka. But instead of sulking or announcing a move to the portal, he bided his time and took QB2 reps.
Then Sluka and UNLV’s NIL agreement ended badly, with Sluka abruptly leaving the team over lack of payment. His very public exit opened the door for HMW.
How has he performed in Sluka’s stead? The UNLV offense is averaging 7.6 yards per play and 50 points per game with him at the controls. The once-frustrated Ricky White III is playing at an All-American level with HMW throwing his way.
Under Sluka, White was averaging just 3.3 receptions and 42 yards per game. With HMW, those numbers have jumped to 10 receptions and 131 yards per contest.
A red-hot offense is now squaring off against a porous Utah State defense. Pick a defensive metric and the Aggies are near the bottom of the FBS rankings.
Pro Football Focus ranks their defense 127th. From a yardage perspective, it’s even worse (129th). And they never get teams behind the sticks. Utah State is 126th in Havoc generated, which means that teams are essentially running their system against air.
Utah State also plays a lot of zone, dialing up pure zone coverage on 72% of its defensive snaps. The problem is that USU grades out as a bottom-30 team when dropping into zone coverage.
What does Marion’s offense carve up? Zone coverage. The Rebels are top 25 in success rate against pure zone, and they're even better with HMW as the starter instead of Sluka.
I’m playing the UNLV team total over 42.5. Not only do I trust in Marion and HMW (17th in QBR) to exploit a non-existent defense, I also know that UNLV has been lights out on special teams this season.
White has been added to the punt block team for the Rebels and already has two blocked punts this season, and one blocked punt return for a score.
In addition to this team total, I’d also play a defensive/special teams TD in this game at +275 or better.
Leg 2: UNLV Team Total Over 42.5
Toledo vs. Buffalo Pick
My theme this week is backing quality coaches.
Buffalo arguably made the biggest upgrade at head coach this offseason. The Bulls were a dysfunctional mess under Maurice Linguist.
That’s the same Linguist that's coaching up the Alabama secondary at the moment. Just rewatch the Georgia and Vanderbilt games to see how well that’s going.
With Linguist out, the UB brass brought in Pete Lembo. He was a really strong coach at Lehigh and Elon before making the jump up to the FBS level with Ball State. He had a two-year run in which he won 19 games in Muncie.
That was enough proof for me to feel optimistic about a Buffalo turnaround this fall. The Bulls already have a ranked win over Northern Illinois and most critically, they had an extra week to prepare for the Rockets.
I faded Toledo against Western Kentucky earlier this season, hoping for Tucker Gleason to turn the ball over. He threw that game away for Toledo, making our gambling dreams come true in the process.
In his last two games, Gleason has been a walking turnover (four interceptions, two lost fumbles and he put two more on the carpet, but they were recovered by his teammates).
He'll keep us in this game, and Buffalo has the defensive playmakers to cash in on his sloppy play. Linebackers Shaun Dolac and Red Murdock are ball hawks, and if they can bloody Gleason’s nose a bit in this game, he’ll put the ball in harm’s way.
This Buffalo offense is nothing special, but it's proven capable at times, scoring 34 on UMass and 30 on Lafayette. The Leopards could win the Patriot League, so I wouldn’t write that data point off.
C.J. Ogbonna and Al-Jay Henderson have cobbled together some decent performances this season out of the UB backfield.
But much like the Coastal play earlier in this column, I just need ball security to win the day. Ogbonna has thrown just one interception this season, and hasn’t put more than one turnover-worthy play on tape in any game.
As they say in Iowa City, “sometimes punting is winning.” Against UMass, in a 34-3 win, Buffalo’s punter Ethan Duane trapped the Minutemen inside their own 20 on four of his five punts. It’s crazy to say it, but if he can punt that well again, I love my chances backing a home 'dog catching 9.5 points.
Leg 3: Buffalo +9.5
