Let’s see which team is the one who takes the win on this Nittany Lions at Buckeyes betting betting preview.
The 20th-ranked Penn State Nittany Lions will travel to Ohio Stadium on Saturday night to take on the fifth-ranked Ohio State Buckeyes in a Big Ten Conference matchup. The Nittany Lions are 5-2 (2-2) and are coming off a 20-18 home loss in a nonuple overtime game.
Senior Sean Clifford finished going 19-of-34 for 165 yards with a touchdown. The Buckeyes are 6-1 (4-0) and coming off a 54-7 road win over the Indiana Hoosiers. Freshman C.J. Stroud finished going 21-of-28 for 266 yards and four touchdowns.
Throwing Dots to Dotson
The Penn State Nittany Lions have been throwing the ball extremely well and senior wide receiver Jahan Dotson has been doing incredibly well. Looking at the season stats, Dotson has 49 catches for 563 yards (11.5 yards per reception) with six touchdowns.
In his previous game against the Fighting Illini, he finished with six receptions for 69 yards (11.5 yards per catch) without finding the end zone. If he can figure out how to be a threat in this offense, Penn State has a chance to pull off the road upset.
The Penn State Nittany Lions have been an incredible defensive unit as they are giving up 14.7 points per game. In their last game against the Illinois Fighting Illini, they allowed 20 points on 395 total yards of offense (38 passing, 357 rushing). The Nittany Lions need to defend better as they allowed the Fighting Illini to go 9-of-18 on third down. The rush defense needs some work as they gave up 5.3 rushing yards per rush.
Running the Ball Well
The Ohio State Buckeyes have been doing well running the football as they have freshman running back TreVeyon Henderson has ran the ball 79 times for 693 yards (8.8 yards per carry) with 11 touchdowns on the ground and eight catches for 168 yards (21 yards per reception) with three receiving touchdowns.
In his last game against the Indiana Hoosiers, he finished with nine rushes for 81 yards (9.0 yards per attempt) and a pair of rushing touchdowns as well as a 14-yard touchdown grab. If he can figure out how to continue to find the end zone, it will be a great chance to win here.
The Ohio State Buckeyes are doing very well defensively as they are allowing 18.6 points per game this year and in their last game against the Indiana Hoosiers, they gave up seven points on 128 total yards of offense (80 passing, 48 rushing). The Hoosiers managed to go 5-of-14 on third down and 0-of-2 on fourth down. Indiana struggled to run the ball as they averaged just 1.3 yards per attempt. If they can do this against a better offense, it will be hard to defeat them.
Who to Bet
The difference between these programs are going to be their offensive play calling and Penn State cannot keep up. The Nittany Lions are scoring 26.6 points per game this season while the Buckeyes are scoring an incredible 49.3 points.
C.J. Stroud has been balling out lately as he has 14 touchdowns without an interception in his previous three games. Penn State is 4-20-2 against the spread following a loss while Ohio State has covered in each of their previous four games this season. All in all, go with the Ohio State Buckeyes to cover the larger spread as they are decisively the better program right now.
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