NCAA College Football Betting Preview – Minnesota Golden Gophers

[Shame About Ray]

The good news for fans of both online NCAA football betting and the Minnesota Golden Gophers’ is that their team is on the rise.

The bad news is that that’s the only place they can go after a 1-11 season. Head coach Tim Brewster is grinding his players through spring practices and better results are on the way even if the wins are not.

Offense:

The Golden Gophers averaged 23.7 points per game over their last seven games, so if there is one “strength” on this team, it was definitely the offense.

The spread offense returns and so does quarterback Adam Weber, who set records for completions, passing yards and touchdowns for a freshman. With another year in this offense, Weber is expected to take great leaps and he’s become a vocal leader this offseason, indicating that he is becoming more confident in year two.

Eric Decker should return as his top target but there is a lot of inexperience around Weber at all of the other skill positions in this offense.

Running back is Nicole Ritchie-thin for depth. Duane Bennett is an OK sophomore and junior Jay Thomas is the extent of the depth, and he’s returning from an ACL injury.

The Gophers will have as many as three new starters on the offensive line, which won’t help Weber curtail those mental mistakes (19 interceptions)

Defense:

The Golden Gophers defense was the worst in the nation last year but it should improve this year – even if by a little bit.

Another class of youngsters including redshirt freshman has been infused and competition is peaking in spring practices. At this point, handicapping the defense is pure speculation since we haven’t seen a lot of these guys perform in regular season games and we don’t know about team chemistry.

On top of the new players, there is a new scheme as well. Ted Roof is now the defensive coordinator and his main focus has been working on basics likes tackling. Considering this defense was brutal last year, stripping it down and rebuilding it is the only way to go.

Tramaine Brock has been the talk of the town on defense this spring. He’s a junior college transfer and looks like he’s going to provide some much-needed leadership and playmaking skills from the free safety position.

There could be as many as eight new starters on this defense so temper expectations for the first half of the season.

Outlook:

The Golden Gophers are clearly under construction and there are virtually no expectations for this season – as there shouldn’t be.

They won only one game last year (none in the Big Ten) and have a slew of freshmen coming in to compete and possibly take over more than half of the starting positions on the team. There is a new defensive coordinator as well.

Head coach Tim Brewster is bringing in his guys and with a top-20 recruiting class, the Golden Gophers are on the way to being respectable right now. But there is too much turnover and too much youth to expect a bowl game.

A strong finish to the season might provide optimism for 2009, but other than that this year is going to be about growing pains.

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.