If there’s one thing just about everyone in the college football world can agree on, it’s that the Ohio State Buckeyes have been the best team in the country so far this season. Not only have the Buckeyes dominated on the field, but they’ve also been on an incredible run in the sportsbooks, which has to have plenty of bettors and Buckeye fans/backers very happy.
Ohio State is 8-0 straight up this season and is the best team in the country against the spread with a perfect record 7-0-1 ATS. (That one “push” came against Ohio, who opened at +31.5, but got down to +28 in some sportsbooks by kickoff. Ohio State won by 28.)
The Buckeyes have been double-digit favorites in all but one game this year, the season opener against Texas, and they’ve been simply dominant with an average margin of victory of 29.8 points, covering the spread by an average of 8 points per game.
Despite losing both coordinators and a boat load of talent from last year’s championship team, Ryan Day has made it clear that this is not a slump year coming off of the national title. Also of note from a betting perspective, the Buckeyes have two players near the top of the current Heisman Trophy odds: wide receiver Jeremiah Smith, the sixth favorite at +4000, and his quarterback Julian Sayin, who is the odds-on favorite at +180 on FanDuel.
All listed betting odds are subject to change
While Ohio State’s dominant run against the spread has been on full display this season, it actually dates back to last year’s playoff run, when the Buckeyes went a perfect 4-0 ATS. Ryan Day's team covered for almost the entirety of all of those games and by an average of 12 points per contest.
This week, Ohio State is once again heavy favorites at -29.5 at Purdue, and they’ll undoubtedly be double-digit favorites in upcoming matchups against UCLA and Rutgers. It will be very interesting to see what the spread is for their season finale in Ann Arbor against the Michigan Wolverines. The Wolverines have been Ohio State’s Achilles’ heel in recent years, winning the past four matchups, with three of those being outright upsets as underdogs, including last year’s game when Michigan won as 23.5-point underdogs, the largest spread in the history of The Game.
No matter how the rest of the season unfolds, Ohio State has already made plenty of fans, and bettors, very happy. As the saying goes: Good teams win. Great teams cover. And right now, Ohio State looks like a very great team.
All listed betting odds are subject to chang