Florida football: How to bet week 2 against Tennessee-Martin

Oddsmakers currently have Florida football favored by 44.5 points against UT-Martin. My recommendation is to wait for the first-half line to come out and to bet on the Gators first-half spread.

2019 Florida football betting record: 1-0 (each wager is 1 unit)

When dealing with these massive spreads, I think psychology becomes more important. The mental aspect can create a unique disparity between the game result and the spread that had been set by oddsmakers.

For example, last week, you had Nebraska favored by 36 points based on its superior level of talent relative to South Alabama’s. But the Cornhuskers were looking ahead to their next match-up against a Colorado team that they’re out for revenge against. They only won by 14, which is a 22-point difference relative to the spread.

We can apply the same concept to Tennessee last week and other teams as well. In these perceived automatic wins, there’s a chance to beat the spread by such a large margin that doesn’t so much exist in games between more evenly-matched teams.

The caveat to betting based on psychology is that it’s not easy to know for sure what’s in a team’s mindset.  To know whether players are looking ahead or concentrated on their next opponent, we’d have to attend practice and talk with the players.

But that doesn’t rule out betting on games with sizable threads. The most insightful venue for us is history — how does this (approximate) group of players typically treat wins that could be perceived as automatic?

Last year, under coach Mullen, Florida went 3-0 ATS when favored by 20 points or more. As 42-point favorites, the Gators beat Charleston  Southern 53-6. They beat Colorado State 48-10 as 20-point favorites. Finally, although they could have been looking ahead to avenge their prior-year loss to rival Florida State, they obliterated Idaho 63-10 as 40-point favorites.

Let’s compare first-half with full-game results. The Gators beat Charleston Southern 38-0 in the first half, only 15-6 in the second. They dominated the Rams 27-3 in the first half, 21-7 in the second. Against Idaho, they were up 49-0 by halftime. 69.5 percent of their scoring and 8.6% of their points allowed came in the first half, meaning that the first-half bet was always unambiguously a wiser bet to make on Florida than the full-game one.

In each of the above games, Florida had either an SEC opponent or in-state rival on deck. The game plan was to fine-tune, put the game to rest early, and then more or less coast through the second half to save energy. With Kentucky on deck, I expect the same game plan.

Regarding fine-tuning, Florida really needs to do a lot of it before it embarks on its upcoming SEC schedule.  On offense, Feleipe Franks‘ stat line belies how poorly he played. On throws that he attempted more than five yards beyond the LOS, he was 6-for-11 with two interceptions — and that’s with the respected play-calling of Dan Mullen. Besides struggling, in general, to find success passing downfield, he missed a lot of open targets, was too inaccurate, and was often quick to leave the pocket.

As for the rest, Florida’s ground game was lackluster. Lamical Perine averaged 4.2 YPC and the team as a whole averaged 1.8. Much of the fault for this should be assigned to an offensive line that didn’t create many holes or generate much push.

On defense, PFF counted 20 missed tackles from Gator players. They need to take better angles to the ballcarrier and secure tackles more quickly after initiating contact.

UT-Martin is a great opponent to put on a show against and to work on things against in the first half. UT-Martin is an FCS opponent and not one of the stronger ones either. The Skyhawks are coming off a 2-9 season which included a 51-14 loss to Missouri in which they were down 38-7 at halftime. The Skyhawks allowed 34 points per game while scoring 28.

In scanning last year’s box scores, it seems clear that the Skyhawks are rather a second-half team. This tendency held true in their season opener in which they allowed 20 first-half points to Northwestern State in the first half, none in the second. They also doubled their own scoring output in the second half.

But whether Florida coasts in the second half or UT-Martin makes adjustments, our first-half bet will already be graded a winner.