Clemson Football: Final odds, best bet and prediction for Tigers vs Orange

It’s fair to say before the season began that if one thought Clemson football would be facing an undefeated team on the backend of the schedule few would have expected that team to be named Syracuse.

Yet, here we are in game 8, the Tigers last of October, and that’s exactly where we are.

We often use the phrase “survive and advance” in relation to Clemson winning closer than expected, such as the game at Wake Forest, and the Orange have had their share of that, too, with a wild and weird 32-29 win over Purdue and a 22-20 win over Tony Elliott and Virginia.

Here we are in game 7 of the season for Syracuse and this is their first true road game and the one in East Hartford was against lowly Connecticut.  Not exactly a gauntlet.

Will that make any difference tomorrow? Maybe, maybe not.  All I know is this is a confident Syracuse bunch, both the team and the fans.

You wouldn’t know they are 13.5-point underdogs by the bravado be espoused.

That number, just a tick under two touchdowns is mighty tempting, but I can’t trust the Tigers, even though I expect they are the superior team.

This team could have a 17-point lead midway through the fourth quarter and decide it’s time to play all 120 or however many players dress out on Homecoming.

I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, I’m saying that means it’s really tough to take Clemson against the spread because it can look really good for most of the game and then – poof – it’s gone, even though you feel it was right.

Best Bet: Clemson team total over 16.5 1st half

There’s a national perception that Clemson starts slow, mostly due to what happened in the first half in Atlanta on Labor Day night, but my feeling is the second half of games is where the Tigers slow down at this point in the season, especially if they have a double digit lead.

I’m expecting the Tigers to score early and end the first half with 17 or 21 points.

Will they cruise in the second half as they did against Furman and Florida State?  Part of that likely depends on what number Syracuse has at the half, but either way I’m not willing to bet that the Tigers cover the 13.5 or their team total of 33.5 as Clemson tends to go into “safe mode” when they have a second half lead.

The perfect script for Clemson football is scoring early and often against the Syracuse Orange

For me, the key is protecting D.J. Uiagalelei, because as we’ve pointed out before, D.J. completes over 70% of his passes when he has a clean pocket.

I expect a heavy dose of the ground game in the second half, both from Shipley and Uiagalelei, with some Phil Mafah thrown in for good measure, throwing the team’s game total number of 33.5 in doubt.

I trust Clemson to score more when the games in doubt, rather than when it’s been decided, as I’ve watched the offense curl up into a ball one too many times when they have a comfortable lead.

Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change