Hoosiers Now

Point Spreads: Hoosiers Big Favorite at Michigan State

Indiana is unbeaten and ranked in the top-10 of both national polls now, and the Hoosiers are 9.5-point favorites on the road at Michigan State next Saturday. Here are the opening lines for all seven Big Ten games for the Nov. 13-14 weekend.
Tom Brew|
Point Spreads: Hoosiers Big Favorite at Michigan State
Point Spreads: Hoosiers Big Favorite at Michigan State

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — People are noticing Indiana's impressive start thus far, including the oddsmakers. They've listed the Hoosiers as a surprising 9.5-point favorite on the DraftKings gambling site for their road game at Michigan State next Saturday.

The Hoosiers are 3-0, beating Penn State, Rutgers and Michigan, and they've done it twice as underdogs to ranked teams in Penn State and Michigan. They were 6-point underdogs to the Nittany Lions in the Oct. 24 opener and were 3.5-point underdogs to Michigan last Saturday, but won anyway, 38-21.

In Indiana's lone road game this season, it was a 12.5-point favorite at Rutgers and won 37-21.

How much difference does a year make? Indiana played Michigan State a year ago and were 14-point underdogs. The Hoosiers lost 40-31, and it was the only game that quarterback Michael Penix Jr. lost. The game was much closer than that. Michigan State went ahead 34-31 on a field goal with 5 seconds left in the game. On the final play of the game after multiple laterals, the ball wound up in the end zone and the Spartans recovered for a touchdown.

Michigan State is 1-2 this season, with a victory over Michigan but blowout losses to Rutgers (at home) and Iowa.

Indiana cracked the top-10 in both the Associated Press and Coaches polls on Sunday, its highest ranking since September of 1969.

Here are the opening lines for all seven Big Ten games in Week 4 of the league's truncated season:

  • Iowa (minus-2.5) at Minnesota, (Friday) 7 p.m. ET
  • Indiana (minus-9.5) at Michigan State, Noon ET
  • Penn State (minus-3.5) at Nebraska, Noon ET
  • Illinois at Rutgers (minus-6.5), Noon ET
  • Ohio State (minus-25.5) at Maryland, 3:30 p.m. ET
  • Wisconsin (minus-1.5) at Michigan, 7:30 p.m. ET
  • Northwestern (minus-1.5) at Purdue, 7:30 p.m. ET

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Tom Brew
TOM BREW

Tom Brew has been the publisher of “Indiana Hoosiers on SI’’ since 2019. He has worked at some of America's finest newspapers as an award-winning reporter and editor for more than four decades, including the Tampa Bay (Fla.) Times, Indianapolis Star and South Florida Sun-Sentinel. He operates seven sites on the “On SI’’ network. Follow Tom on Twitter @tombrewsports.

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