Best Bet to Make in the Season Opener Between the Western Michigan Broncos and Michigan Wolverines

In the season opener for both teams, the Western Michigan Broncos will come to Ann Arbor to take on the Michigan Wolverines. It'll be the first game of the Kyle Whittingham era at Michigan, and with the Oklahoma game on deck in week two, Michigan will need to play well in this one to help springboard them into next week's matchup.

Let's dive more into both teams below as we analyze what the pre-season power ratings say about each team.

Western Michigan sophomore Broc Lowry throws a pass during the home-opening game against North Texas | USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect

Western Michigan Broncos

Western Michigan had a good 2025, finishing 10-4 with a blowout bowl win over Kennesaw State. They bring back a handful of key contributors as well, with their quarterback Broc Lowry returning after throwing for 1,803 yards and 9 TD's. He also ran for 963 yards and 14 TD's so he's a true dual-threat quarterback for this Western Michigan offense. They also brought back Jalen Buckley at running back who rushed for 1,003 yards and 9 TD's.

They did lose their star defensive coordinator to the Los Angeles Chargers though, and the defense was by far their best unit in 2025. They finished 9th nationally in scoring defense last season and 17th in total defense. With a new coordinator taking over, it'll be interesting to see if they can slow down this new Michigan Wolverines offense.

Michigan Wolverines

As you all should know, Kyle Whittingham took over this off-season after a tumultuous tenure under former head coach Sherrone Moore. He made two excellent coordinator hires in Jason Beck from Utah to lead the offense and Jay Hill from BYU to lead the defense. This whole coaching staff will have the most talent at their disposal that they've ever had, with the Wolverines currently boasting a top 10 overall roster in the sport. If Kyle Whittingham can take much less talented teams at Utah to 10-win seasons, how he might perform at Michigan should have no ceiling.

Back is a lot of the offense from last year, but the defense has a number of notable players to replace. Jaishawn Barham(NFL), Derrick Moore(NFL), and Cole Sullivan(Transferred to Oklahoma) being arguably the biggest shoes to fill for 2026.

New coordinators Jason Beck and Jay Hill will both be implementing new schemes as well and nobody truly knows how each side of the ball will look until they actually play in this game.

Blake Corum hurdles a Broncos defender | The Detroit News

Power Rating Analysis

My favorite set of publicly available Power Ratings is the KFord Ratings. The KFord Ratings have Michigan power rated at 18th in the country pre-season, with a rating of 15.9. That means on average, against the perfectly average football team (for example UCF is a perfect 0.0), Michigan would be favored by about 16 points in that game per this model.

Western Michigan on the other hand, is rated at a -6.1, ranking 88th nationally. To get the projected spread for this model, you simply take the Michigan rating of 15.9 and add the Western Michigan rating of a 6.1 to it, and you'd get a 22 point spread on a neutral field per this model. Now this game is obviously in Ann Arbor, and the better home field advantages in the sport are typically worth 3-5 points. In this game, I'd give Michigan three points in their favor for home field advantage and that would bump the spread up for this game, based on this model, projected at Michigan -25.

Tru Wilson carries the ball against Western Michigan | The Detroit News

Spread Analysis

The actual current spread for this game is Michigan -27.5 at DraftKings. According to the KFord Ratings, the Western Michigan side is showing some value with the projected spread at -25 in favor of Michigan, with about a 2.5 point difference in favor of the Western Michigan side.

For the best bet in this game, I would side with the model and take the Broncos +27.5. I believe this game will be a bit of a tune-up for the Wolverines, with them not wanting to show too much in advance of their big matchup next week. It's also a good chance to get some young guys playing time with one of the easier matchup of the season.

I'm predicting something close to a 34-10 Michigan win in this one, and for that reason I would take the Broncos +27.5 as the best bet for this game.

Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help, call 1-800-GAMBLER.

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