Notre Dame at Michigan Point Spread

There’s no second-guessing which premier matchup takes the cake in college football’s second week. Southern Cal travels to Ohio State to face off against the Buckeyes at the Horseshoe, so there will be enough coverage of this Top-10 collision. Bet on football this weekend at BetUS and get a $500 FREE bonus!

Even with that game on the board, we’re going to concentrate on another key game, our matchup of the week is Notre Dame taking on the Michigan Wolverines. Both Notre Dame and Michigan looked great in their opening week games, and now the heat is on for the two prestigious programs to see which can keep their progress heading in the right driection by picking up the win here.

Charlie Weis probably couldn’t have asked for a better way to the season last week against Nevada. Of course, Nevada couldn’t put upt any points throughout the contest, but it was the coherent and deadly passing game that flourished under quarterback Jimmy Clausen. The junior, who appears to have finally tapped into his potential, passed for 315 yards on 15-of-18 and four scores. His receivers Michael Floyd and Golden Tate look to be a fairly high impact pair, while tight end Kyle Rudolph is athletically talented enough to dominate at both catching passes and blocking. The ground game, however, still appears questionable, and 178 yards overall on the ground against a wobbly Wolf Pack defense still doesn’t do much to convince me. Still, Notre Dame was able to cover as 14.5-point chalk on their home field.

Michigan, also wowed their crowd, but it was the new guys that managed to charm the attention of the U of M supporters. True freshman quarterback Tate Forcier tossed three scores and managed the offense for most of the game, not having any mistakes. Another first-year star rising is the speed merchant Denard Robinson, who got some headlines in the preseason for not tying his shoes when playing. Seemingly he needs not to, as a outstanding 43-yard dash to hit pay dirt displayed he recognizes exactly how to make things happen when he has the football. Just like the Irish, Michigan covered the spread, as a 31-7 win exceeded the 13 points they laid at home to Western Michigan.

Now on to this matchup. And the decisive element with two offenses that seem capable of scoring points should be the defenses and which team is more effective when called upon. Personally, and this may be me being biased towards Michigan, the Wolverines have a faster and stronger defensive unit. I think they will be able to get in the backfield, and the secondary seems more able to hold its own in the passing game. And that will be the determining factor, as Weis will sure enough make a firm choice to go down the field and see how effective Clausen can be in tearing up the secondary of the Wolverines for some action in the passing game.

Notre Dame comes in as 3.5-point road favorites. However the football odds can be found at 3 if you compare between books. I would think keep steady between 3 and 3.5, and that could be important, as this should be a tight game the whole way in Ann Arbor. The dog has covered all but two of the past 10 games in this series, but Notre Dame is 7-3 ATS in the past 10 against Michigan. The Irish’s last win in Ann Arbor was in 2005, and U of M has won four of the past five at home over Notre Dame. No total has been released yet, but if I had to make out a predictions, I would estimate around 44 or 45. Cash in with Doc’s Sports this week as they have a complete slate of games for their clients!