2008 Central Michigan Chippewas Football Gambling Preview

[Shame About Ray]

NCAA Football Betting – Central Michigan Preview

It’s time for the football betting and sports wagering community to hit the books. Today NCAA betting fanatics will be looking at the Central Michigan Chippewas. Central Michigan reeled in a second consecutive MAC Championship and is again favored to win the conference in 2008. The offense is humming with very few concerns, but the defense will define how good the Chippewas will be. Anything short of nine or 10 wins would be a disappointment in Mt. Pleasant.



Offense

Central Michigan’s offense is built around a pretty special quarterback. Dan LeFevour is only the second quarterback in NCAA history to pass for 3000 yards and rush for 1000 (the first was Vince Young).

Led by the MAC Offensive Player of the Year, the Chippewas dynamic offense won’t have many problems matching the 35 points per game. Depending on how good the Chippewas finish, it wouldn’t be a surprised if LeFevour was mentioned along with the Heisman Trophy.

LeFevour will be working with a pretty special wideout in Antonio Brown. As a freshman, Brown racked up 2267 all-purpose yards (MAC record) and caught 102 passes (school record). Bryan Anderson and Kito Poblah round out the receivers.

The offensive line returns four starters and the running game is more than capable with two experienced starters returning.

There aren’t any glaring weaknesses on offense.

Defense

The Central Michigan defense has plenty of holes to fill and considering only Rice allowed more than passing yards in Division I-A football.

Starting with the secondary, three starters return. Last year, the biggest issue was injuries as the defensive back rotation was a revolving door.

The defense returns seven starters but they finished ranked 112th in scoring defense.

Two starting, all-conference linebackers are gone but the one that returns is Nick Bellore. He has All-MAC potential and has to be a real playmaker in the center of this defense.

The defense line looks strong and helped lead the MAC in run defense. But that stat is a bit skewed since the pass defense was so horrible and teams felt less of a need to run the ball.

The Chippewas were one of the worst defenses in the nation last year and they won’t be significantly better, but if they can stay healthy, they will be improved.

Outlook

The Chippewas are the class of the MAC but their schedule isn’t exactly easy. They have road games at Georgia, Purdue and Indiana and they only have five home games on the year. They also finish the season with four of their final five games on the road.

The good news is that their key matchup with Ball State is at home this year.

BetUS sportsbook already has tons of college football Futures betting available for those of us who can't wait. Bet on the Heisman winner, Conference and Divisional winners and, of course, the 2009 BCS National Championship winner.