2005 Akron Zips Handicapping Review

 

By Tom Wilkinson

 

While Akron was entered the 2004 campaign coming off a rare winning season (straight up) in 2003, the Zips had failed to post a winning season against the odds for the third year in a row. Already playing in the Mid American Athletic Conference, Akron was not a team that would be regularly, if ever, topping the list of football picks for any sports bettors but add their obscurity to that lack of sports betting production and you have a team that, potentially, could offer some potentially strong sports handicapping value under the right circumstances.

Akron began their season at Penn State against Joe Paterno’s sliding program as 15.5-point dogs. While many sports bettors were leery about laying double digits with a questionable Penn State team, fewer still wanted Akron anywhere near their lists of football picks. Penn State bombed the Zips 48-10. Akron went on to lose their next two games both straight up and against the odds to Middle Tennessee State at home, and then on the road at Virginia. At this point, Akron was 0-3 both straight up and against the spread and carried little, if any, sports handicapping respect.

Just as they reached the point of being totally unappealing Akron became a tremendous sports handicapping bargain in their very next game at Kent State, where as 6.5-point dogs they won straight up 24-19. Unfortunately, in their next game, they were blown out 19-49 as 17.5-point dogs at MAC power Northern Illinois. This was Akron’s fourth failure against the odds in five games and, once again, they carried little appeal or mention at online sports betting blogs.

At this point, Akron was about as anonymous as a college football team could possibly be in the sports handicapping community. Outside of a few professionals, the MAC generates little sports betting interest and it’s losing teams, virtually none at all.

But starting with a 44-21 home win over Buffalo as 9-point home chalks, Akron began a five-game winning streak both straight up and against the odds and ended up in a showdown with Miami of Ohio for the MAC East Division crown and shot at the MAC title game. By this time Akron earned some sports handicapping respect and attention, but lost as 8-point dogs.