The Bettor’s Guide to UCF vs. ECU

The UCF Knights and East Carolina Pirates kick off this Saturday at noon in Greenville, North Carolina. UCF is currently a 27 point favorite with the over/under set at 77, according to OddsShark. With an offense like UCF has, it’s hard to not bet on them covering the spread and hitting the over, but lets take a look at what history has to tell us.

The Spread

Since Josh Heupel took over as head coach, the Knights have been favored by 20 or more 10 times with UCF being 5-5 against the spread, two of those games being against East Carolina. Last season, UCF was a 34.5 point favorite against ECU at home with the final score being 41-28. In 2018, Darriel Mack’s first start of his career, UCF was a 22 point favorite with the final score being 37-10. During the Heupel era, UCF is also 0-3 against the spread in noon games.

The Over/Under

Saturday’s matchup will be the second highest over/under for a UCF game in the Heupel era with the 2018 Memphis game being the highest at 80.5. In the games where the O/U is set at 64.5 or more, the total has gone under 11 of 15 times with one push. Last year’s UCF/ECU matchup had the O/U set at 64.5 with the over hitting with 69 total points scored. I should also note that in noon UCF games, the total went under two of three times with one push.

In Conclusion

All the data in the world can’t accurately predict what’s going to happen on Saturday despite it giving us some sense of direction. The three main factors for me when evaluating this game are:

• We haven’t seen ECU play a game yet.
• Heupel is known to lay off the gas once up by a lot.
• UCF’s offense may be the best it’s been under Heupel.

Picks

OddsShark

UCF covers the spread and the total will go under with a projected score of 50.8-22.2.

Public Consensus

UCF covers the spread (71%) and the total will go under (51%).

Luke

UCF covers the spread and the total will go under.

Bonus Prop Picks

• UCF Total Over 51.5 (-115)
• UCF First Team to Score (-200)