College football predictions: Illinois, Arizona are Friday’s best bets

There is a lot happening in college football on Friday night, as five games are on the schedule across five different conferences. The ACC, American, Big Ten, Mountain West and Big 12 will all be in action, so there’s pretty much something for everyone.

I’ve got a couple of plays for Friday’s slate from the power conferences.

Nebraska (-4.5, 50) vs. Illinois

5 p.m. Friday, Fox

Pick: Illinois +4.5

The Illini are a different team with Katin Houser at quarterback. He returned last week for a 20-17 win over Maryland, which doesn’t look terribly impressive on paper given the final score. However, Illinois outgained the Terrapins 407-288, and it was one of the strongest defensive efforts of the season for Bret Bielema’s team.

Houser wasn’t particularly sharp in his return from a hand injury, but he’s very experienced at the position and was able to create several explosive plays, throwing for 223 yards on just 18 completions. For the season, he has a 13-to-5 touchdown-to-interception ratio and has completed 64.8 percent of his passes.

With Houser back in the lineup, Maryland had to respect the running game more, and that helped Illinois average 5.6 yards per carry. That should be a positive development going forward.

Nebraska has fielded a stout defense for most of the season. The Blackshirts entered the week ranked 17th nationally in yards per carry allowed, including just 2.99 yards per carry in Big Ten play. We’ll see whether Illinois can leverage its physicality and maintain a balanced offensive attack. Houser’s presence certainly helps, though the Cornhuskers have faced several talented conference opponents and largely kept them in check.

Ultimately, I’m backing Illinois because I’m not sure what’s going on with Anthony Colandrea. He isn’t operating anywhere near peak efficiency right now. The Nebraska quarterback has a 2-to-5 touchdown-to-interception ratio over his last three games and has not been much of a factor as a runner. During that span, he has carried the ball 37 times for 105 yards. Over four games in October, the Cornhuskers averaged fewer than 5 yards per play.

If Colandrea isn’t providing that dual-threat element, this is a very pedestrian offense at best. It’s also worth noting that he has been sacked 11 times over the last three games. He’s taking a lot of punishment between the sacks, knockdowns and designed runs, and he’s not an especially big player at 6 feet and 200 pounds.

TCU at Arizona (-7, 46)

7:15 p.m. Friday, ESPN

Pick: Arizona -7

The Fort Worth faithful seem to be losing faith in the Horned Frogs. Sonny Dykes set the bar extremely high with the program’s run to the College Football Playoff early in his tenure, and now a 4-4 record, even with one of the nation’s best defenses, isn’t enough. It isn’t an exciting style of football, either.

TCU scored 22 points last week against Kansas, the most the Horned Frogs have scored since putting up 31 against Arkansas State and 63 against Grambling earlier this season. In other words, it was their best Power Four offensive performance to date.

For a coach who built his reputation on the offensive side of the ball, that has to be a major source of frustration. The program was unable to keep quarterback Josh Hoover, who transferred to Indiana, and instead pinned its hopes on Harvard transfer Jaden Craig.

Craig has been solid, posting an 11-to-6 touchdown-to-interception ratio and adding a couple of rushing touchdowns. However, he has also been sacked 21 times and is averaging just 1.6 yards per carry.

This is a pretty telling combination of point spread and total. Obviously, expectations are for a low-scoring game, but Arizona is laying a significant number in a game with a total in the mid-40s. We can all agree that Noah Fifita is the better quarterback. Fifita played well in last week’s loss to Texas Tech, throwing for 417 yards. He has a 19-to-4 touchdown-to-interception ratio this season and an 8-to-2 ratio in Big 12 play.

Fifita was sacked five times by a Texas Tech defense that has recorded 28 sacks in eight games. TCU, despite its strong defensive numbers, has only 18 sacks. Arizona is tied for 10th nationally with 25 sacks.

Given how many hits Craig has taken this season, I really like Fifita’s ability to stay on schedule and ahead of the chains. I don’t think TCU will have that same luxury in this matchup.