Illinois Fighting Illini vs. Penn State Nittany Lions

[Shame About Ray]

Big Ten play kicks off for two ranked teams on Saturday night when Illinois head coach Ron Zook leads his Fighting Illini (2-1, 0-2 ATS) into Beaver Stadium to take on the Penn State Nittany Lions (4-0, 3-0 ATS).

Last season, the Illini got the best of Penn State, knocking off PSU 27-20 in Champaign as three-point underdogs. The last time these two teams hooked up in Happy Valley, Penn State won 26-12, but Illinois successfully covered the 17.5-point spread. The Nittany Lions are now up to #12 in the AP Poll, while Illinois chimes in at #22...

Illinois had a very scary game against Louisiana-Lafayette last weekend. They were favored by 25-points and were expected to romp their opponents from the Sun Belt, but ended up getting a stiff challenge from the Ragin’ Cajuns instead.

After jumping out to a 17-3 halftime lead, the Illini took their foot off the gas and allowed ULL to hang around. Lafayette scored with 0:18 left to close the gap to 20-17, but Illinois salted away the last few seconds to preserve the victory.

The Illini failed to cover the spread by over three touchdowns, but the winning margin for ‘under’ bettors was an even greater 24-points. QB Juice Williams was wildly inconsistent, completing 13-of-25 passes for 147 yards and a touchdown with an interception. Arrelious Benn is normally a vital piece to the Illinois offense, but he only touched the ball four times for 32 yards. He must step up and have a much bigger game if the Illini are to pull off the upset this weekend.

Penn State bettors have had a tremendous start to the 2008 season. They are 3-0 ATS on the season, and have outscored their four opponents by an average of 42.8 ppg. Last week, Temple took its best shot at the Nittany Lions, but as 29.5-point underdogs, no one gave the Owls much of a chance.

Unlike Illinois, Penn State answered the bell. PSU was dominant on both sides of the ball, limiting the Owls to a measly 138 total yards of offense while racking up 546 yards of its own. Both the rushing and passing games were working well, as Daryll Clark and Pat Devlin combined to throw for 243 yards, while the rushing game averaged a whopping 6.7 yards per carry. The 45-3 victory was yet another easy pointspread victory for those who backed the Nittany Lions.

PSU ranks in the top-30 in just about every major category on both sides of the ball. The non-conference season is over though, so expect HC Joe Paterno to find more difficult times ahead of them in the weeks to come.

Penn State opened up as a 15-point favorite, but has since been bet down to 14. The ‘total’ currently sits at 58. BetUS.com has all of your NCAA football betting options open until the opening kickoff, so before you turn on ABC, login to your account and get your action down for this great Big 10 match-up!

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