Best bet to take in Washington at Michigan

The Vegas line currently has it at -5.5 in favor of the Wolverines when they will host the Washington Huskies tomorrow at noon. Currently sitting at 5-1 overall, and 2-1 in conference play, the Huskies have a good argument to be a top 25 team entering this week. They sit just outside of the rankings but their only loss on the season is to the #1 team, the Ohio State Buckeyes. They didn't play anyone of real note in the non-conference and in conference they've played at Maryland and hosted Rutgers (outside of the Ohio State game). The road trip to Maryland in particular is a really long distance to travel so I do give them some credit for being able to do that successfully, as most Big Ten teams have struggled when they have to cross multiple time zones.

On offense, Washington is a really good team. Their quarterback Demond Williams Jr. is a dynamic player who’s drawn some comparisons to Kyler Murray. He’s a very dangerous player and he also has a possible 1st round pick at wide receiver in Denzel Boston to throw to in addition to a good running back beside him in the backfield in Jonah Coleman. Those three skill players are all very good players and it will be a big challenge for this Michigan defense to keep them in check. The KFord Ratings, which are my favorite publicly available set of power ratings, have Washington with the country's 11th best offense (For reference USC is at #1) so this is a very good unit and close to the nation's elite.

Their defense has been banged up in recent weeks following the Ohio State game but they've been fairly decent on that side of the ball. KFord Ratings has them at the 35th best defense (For reference USC's defense is ranked 51st in this metric) so it is a solid group overall and Michigan's offense needs to play better than it did last week to have a chance to win this game.

On Michigan’s side, they’ll need to regroup from their West Coast trip where they lost by two scores to USC. Michigan’s defense and offense both struggled in that game so both sides of the ball need to show improvement to win this game against a good Washington team. They also may be without star running back Justice Haynes, and if he isn't able to give it a go in this one look for Jordan Marshall to be the feature back.

The KFord Ratings have this Michigan team ranked 33rd on offense and 16th on defense so it's almost an exact flip of what this Washington Huskies team is on paper. That makes it a very interesting game to handicap, as it'll essentially be strength on strength of which unit plays better, the Washington offense or Michigan's defense.

As for the actual best bet in this game, the KFord ratings set has Michigan at a 15.6 and Washington at a 13.4. That means on a neutral field, Michigan would be favored by 2.2 points. If you factor in home field advantage and it would put Michigan at a -5 according to the KFord Ratings.

At -5, it shows a slight value on the Washington side and I agree with the model on this one. Michigan really struggled last week on the road and gets to come back for this one and play at home. Washington has to make a similar road trip as Michigan did last week and I think that plays a factor here as well with a noon eastern time kickoff. I believe Michigan gets back in the win column and wins a close game here by a score of 30-27 so I'll take the Huskies +5.5 as my best bet of the game this week.

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