Louisville vs. Miami score prediction by college football computer model

Sitting at one loss through 10 games, Louisville is in the driver's seat to possibly clinch a berth in the ACC Championship Game as soon as this weekend, but not before passing an important late-season road test against conference rival Miami on Saturday.

Win, and you're in: it's that simple for the Cardinals, who can book a trip to Charlotte to face Florida State in the ACC title game with a W here
Lose, and more dominoes could fall down the stretch with another game to play and a potential tie-breaker situation to sort it all out
Louisville is top 30 nationally by scoring 32.7 points per game on average and rank 29th with 188 rushing yards per outing
And the Cardinals are 13th in FBS allowing just 17.1 points to opponents
Miami has dropped the last two games, but hasn't allowed over 30 points in a game over the last month
Hurricanes are 2-4 in conference but 6-0-1 against Louisville all-time

What can we make of the matchup? For that, let's turn to the SP+ prediction model to forecast the game.

Louisville vs. Miami prediction

The simulations favor Louisville to come out ahead, but by the narrowest of margins.

SP+ forecasts that the Cardinals will take down Miami by a projected score of 26 to 25 and to win the game by a projected 0.3 points overall.

The model gives Louisville a close 51 percent chance to win the game outright.

SP+ is a “tempo- and opponent-adjusted measure of college football efficiency” that attempts to predict game outcomes by measuring “the most sustainable and predictable aspects of football.”

How good is it this season? So far, the SP+ model is 298-299-13 (49.9%) in its picks against the spread after going 36-28 (56.3%) last week.

Point spread

Miami is a 0.5 point favorite against Miami, according to the lines at SI Sportsbook, which set the total at 46.5 points for the game.

SI lists the moneyline odds for UL at -110 and for Miami at -110.

If you're using this projection to bet the game, you should take...

Louisville +0.5
Louisville to win -105
Over 46.5 points

Computer prediction

Other analytic models are split on who will win the game.

That includes the College Football Power Index, a computer prediction model that uses data points from both teams to simulate games 20,000 times to pick winners.

The index is taking a different view this week, naming Miami as the narrow favorite, coming out ahead in 52.8 percent of its simulations. Louisville wins out in the remaining 47.2 percent of sims.

By taking the difference between each team's projected scoring margin per game, the computer estimates that Miami will defeat Louisville by 1.8 points, enough to cover the line.

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Louisville at Miami game time

When: Sat., Nov. 18
Time: 12 p.m. Eastern
TV: ABC network
Stream live: fuboTV (Try for free)

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