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06/15/2007 - Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - My 2007 college football conference previews wont begin for another month but with the NBA Finals over and the Triple Crown races completed, its time to jump all over a week one contest that looks too good to be true - Georgia Tech at Notre Dame.

Yes, I know the game wont be played until September 1st. Nonetheless, how many five-star plays are so obvious they cannot wait to be released, even with two and a half months in the interim?

Notre Dame was the NCAAs medias darling last season, despite losing by a combined 73 points to LSU, USC and Michigan. The Fighting Irish had won three games over Georgia Tech, Michigan State and UCLA by a grand total of 10 points and their other seven victories came against teams with a combined record of 37-51.

The Irish finished the season at 10-3, but with a disturbing 4-8-1 mark against the spread (ATS). The much-ballyhooed offensive attack never materialized as the team averaged six points and 66 yards less per game in 07 as opposed to 06. The boys from South Bend ended with a 6-1 home mark with a disastrous ATS record of 2-5.

Georgia Tech had won nine of 10 games after dropping a 14-10 decision to Notre Dame in week one last year. However, three straight losses to end the year left the Yellow Jackets with a disappointing 9-5 record. One statistic that contributed to the losing ways was a turnover differential of -6 in those final three contests.

Calvin Johnson caught his last ball at Georgia Tech, which is a major negative, but the fact that Reggie Ball has thrown his last pass makes up for it. Taylor Bennett will start for the Jackets this season after completing 19-of-29 for 326 yards and three TDs in the Gator Bowl loss to West Virginia. The 326 yards were the most thrown in a game by a single Tech QB since 2001.

NOTRE DAME OFFENSE VS. GEORGIA TECH DEFENSE

We will finally see how much of a difference Charlie Weis can make with a team that returns just nine overall starters, along with a brand new quarterback, halfback and two wide receivers. There are three QBs vying for the number one job, including top prospect, Jimmy Clausen, but none have impressed the coaching staff enough to gain a decided edge.

Weis has already stated that the team will look to run the ball much more in 07, especially in the early going. Unfortunately, both guards from last year have moved on leaving the team extremely inexperienced inside the tackles for that type of offense.

Georgia Techs defensive strength resides in its front four. The Jackets' run defense ranked second to Miami in ACC play, giving up just 91 yards per game. They also tied the Hurricanes with 24 sacks, led by linebacker Philip Wheeler who had nine. The senior finished the year second on the team in tackles (89), including 10 against the Irish!

Another big negative for Notre Dame in this opening day match-up is the lack of height of its new wide receivers. David Grimes and George West are both under six feet, while last years starters Jeff Samardzija and Rhema McKnight were 6-feet-5 and 6-feet-2, respectively. Both of Techs projected starting corners are 6-feet or over. The Yellow Jackets were one of only 30 schools to have more interceptions than TD passes allowed, and they return four players in the secondary who started at least seven games last season.

NOTRE DAME DEFENSE VS. GEORGIA TECH OFFENSE

A new coordinator will be roaming the sidelines for the Fighting Irish this year. Corwin Brown, who had been the New York Jets DBs coach, takes over for Rick Minter, and will institute a change from a 4-3 defense to a 3-4. Its a smart move since the club has lost three starters from 2006.

The back seven, led by super safety Tom Zbikowski and leading tackler, LB Maurice Crum, will be the strength of the unit, but the run defense is a major question mark. Last year, with an experienced front four, opponents rushed for just under four yards per carry. In addition, 19 of the clubs 31 sacks have to be replaced as Victor Abiamiri and Derek Landri have taken 17.5 of them to the NFL.

Georgia Techs superb rushing attack will take full advantage of NDs weak defensive line, which allowed 176 yards (4.9 ypc) to its own top four halfbacks in the Spring Game. Yellow Jackets running back Tashard Choice, who led the ACC in rushing last year with 1,473 and a 5.0 average, will have a field day vs. the Irish, especially since hell be running behind an experienced offensive line that returns four starters.

New quarterback Bennett Taylor cemented his position as Techs future signal- caller by completing 10-of-15 passes for 197 yards in the spring game. Even though Calvin Johnson is gone, look for James Johnson and redshirt freshman, Demaryius Thomas to pick up the slack. Johnson caught 39 balls last season, improving from just 14 as a freshman and Thomas was the talk of the spring with six receptions for 87 yards.

LAST YEARS GAME

They met in South Bend on September 2, 2006 with Notre Dame pulling out the four-point victory, failed to cover the 6.5-point spread. The Jackets raced to an early 10-0 lead only to see it whittle away midway in the third quarter. A questionable late hit called on Philip Wheeler gave Brady Quinn and the ND offense an automatic first down on third-and-10 deep inside Georgia Tech territory. The Irish cashed in when Darius Walker scampered 13 yards for the go-ahead and eventual winning score.

Most of the Notre Dame's yardage came from Quinn and Walker. They combined for 345 of the 384 total yards - a figure that wont be repeated this season. Even though the contest will be played in South Bend, Georgia Tech has the edge in all skill positions, and more importantly, on both sides of the line of scrimmage.

WINNING ON THR ROAD

The Jackets have fared well in their opening road contest each of the last three years, so being away from home will pose no problems. They handed Virginia Tech its first loss of the season last year, defeated Auburn the previous season, 23-14, and chopped down Clemson in Death Valley back in 2004. The Irish will be three to five-point favorites in this contest and they wont even win the game!

Throughout the season there will be many other opportunities to cash in, but none look as strong as this match-up of a team geared for a top-15 finish against a highly-overrated club that might get a bowl bid on name alone. Stay tuned throughout the summer, as I preview more opening week match-ups while unlocking the easiest wins in early September.

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Sportsbook Betting Lines

Who Makes the Sportsbook Betting Lines?

Las Vegas Sports Consultants (LVSC) is the world’s premier oddsmaking company and the most respected authority on making the lines. Mike Seba is a Senior Oddsmaker at LVSC and has been making lines for the last six years. In our extended interview, Seba explained that there are 4-5 oddsmakers assigned to make lines for each of the major sports (pro & college football and basketball; MLB, NHL, boxing, golf). Each of these oddsmakers bring unique opinions, strengths and weaknesses to the process. Oddsmakers at LVSC are professional sports junkies who love what they do and would probably do it for nothing if you asked them, but they do get paid for it. By necessity their approach is very research-oriented and concise, since with millions of dollars at risk there is little margin for error.

“You either have a passion for it or you don’t,” Seba said.

“The #1 thing for us is to make a line for each game that creates good two-way action. We do this by drawing from past experiences and applying them to current situations. People think it’s much more complicated, but it’s not. “

What are the Football Betting Lines Trying to Accomplish?

There is a common misconception that point spreads represent the oddsmakers’ prediction of how many points the favorite will win by. That is not the case at all – their intent is NOT to evenly split the ATS result between the teams; rather, their goal is to attract equal betting action on both sides. Stated another way, they want to create a line that half the people find appealing to bet one way while the other half find it appealing to bet the other way (known as ‘dividing the action’).

Divided action means the sportsbook is guaranteed a profit on the game because of the fee charged to the bettor (called juice or vig – typically $11 bet to win $10).

How the Opening Line Is Made

The opening line is the first line created by the oddsmakers, which is then sent out to sportsbooks. Of course there is an entire method to the madness on how the opening line is created. Seba explained that it all starts with each oddsmaker creating a line on each game based upon their own personal approach. This usually includes having up-to-date power ratings on each team.

Power ratings are the oddsmaker’s value of each team and are used as a guide to calculate a "preliminary" pointspread on an upcoming game. The power ratings are adjusted after each game a team plays. Examples of non-game factors that would require an adjustment to a team's power rating are key player injuries and player trades.

Once a game’s power rating based pointspread is determined, the oddsmaker will make adjustments to that line after considering each team's most recent games played and previous games played against that opponent. Also, adjustments are made after reading each team’s local newspapers to get a sense of what the coaches & players are thinking going into the game.

Since the oddsmaker’s ultimate goal is equally dividing the sports betting action, public perception and sportsbook betting patterns must be taken into account. For example, the public might have heavy betting interest week after week on a popular college football betting team such as USC. If an oddsmaker comes up with a preliminary line of USC -7, then an adjustment up to -7.5 or -8 would be made in response to the public’s expected USC bias.

The last step in the line-making process for each oddsmaker is taking one final look to determine whether or not the line "feels right." This is where common sense and past experience with how games are bet enters into the picture.

A round-table discussion among the 4-5 oddsmakers involved in making the line for each sport is then conducted and a consensus line is decided upon by the Odds Director before it is released to the sportsbooks. Of the 4-5 oddsmakers, generally the 2 most respected opinions are weighed more heavily by the Odds Director before he decides on the final line.

Why Sports Betting Lines Change

Once the opening line is released by LVSC, the individual sportsbooks decide if they want to make any adjustments before offering it to the public. Reasons for such adjustments include:

Experts working for the individual books having a strong opinion on the game

Individual books having players who consistently bet with certain tendencies (such as an extreme bias toward favorites or toward a certain popular team like USC)

The purpose of these adjustments, like all line adjustments, is to more equally divide the betting action.

Once betting begins, sportsbooks can adjust the line at any time. In doing so they attempt to make more attractive the team that is getting less action. By moving the line, sportsbooks can influence how the public bets on a particular game.

For example, if the pointspread on a game is 7 and most of the money is coming in on the underdog (taking the +7), sportsbooks will then move the number down to 6 ½ to try and attract money on the favorite.

Moving the line is the oddsmaker's effort to balance betting action, and often times such moves can have a major impact on a bettor’s decision. Oddsmakers can also change the line depending on various event-related factors such as player injuries or weather. Obviously, if the line comes out a week ahead of the event (which is the case in football), there is much that could happen during the week leading up to the event that could affect the line. Oddsmakers have to determine if any changes are necessary and send out an "adjusted line."

“The main objective is that our clients get equal action on both sides,” Seba said. “We’re not trying to pick the team that covers the spread, we’re trying to make it a coin flip, a tough decision (for the bettor). If we’ve done that, we’ve done our job.”

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