Saturday was a looooong day of sports betting action in the Tuley’s Takes home office.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t as fun since it was one of our rare losing days in November, with the low-light being the 38-27 loss of our Best Bet on Notre Dame +4.5 vs. USC. The Irish were able to stick around with a strong effort from the defense, but the offense wasn’t able to keep up and Southern Cal turned in a Heisman-winning performance. It seems kind of odd to say that considering Notre Dame’s offense scored 27 points while the defense gave up 38, but that’s how it was. I also lost with the Irish +165 ML in VSiN’s BetsGiving, but remain near the top of the standings with three plays on Sunday: Texans +14 at the Dolphins, Texans-Dolphins Under 47 and the Raiders ML at 165. We’ll see how that works out heading into the Monday night finale. As for the rest of Saturday, I won with Minnesota +3 at Wisconsin but also lost on Coastal Carolina and Louisville for a 1-3 ATS day…blah! Despite the Notre Dame loss, our daily Best Bets are 18-8 ATS (69.2%) the first 26 days of November, including 14-5 ATS (73.7%) the last 19 days, so let’s get to the our recaps of the rest of Saturday’s action and move to our Best Bets for NFL Sunday. Then, as has become our custom here, we’ll rerun and update our Wednesday column in which we give our “takes” on the full NFL Week 12 schedule.Saturday’s Recaps
CFB: No. 3 Michigan ran over No. 2 Ohio State 45-23 as 9-point road underdogs and +280 on the money line. South Carolina upset No. 8 Clemson 31-30 as 14-point road dog and +450 on ML. No. 6 USC (-4.5) won and covered in 38-27 win vs. No. 15 Notre Dame. Texas A&M (+10) upset No. 5 LSU 38-23. No. 21 Oregon State (-1) rallied to win and cover in 38-34 win vs. No. 9 Oregon. No. 7 Alabama (-22) pushed on closing line in 49-27 win vs. Auburn.
CBB: No. 2 Houston escaped with 49-44 win, but never came close to covering as 19.5-point home favorite. TCU upset No. 25 Iowa 79-66 at Emerald Coast Classic. No. 4 Texas routed Texas-Rio Grande Valley 91-54, covering a 33.5-point chalk in the Leon Black Classic.
NBA: Dogs swept 4-0 ATS Saturday with 3 outright upsets by Raptors (+2.5 in 105-100 win vs. Mavericks), Rockets (+2 in 118-105 win vs. Thunder) and Lakers (+1 in 143-138 win at Spurs). The Jazz (+6) covered in 113-112 loss at the Suns. Home teams led 3-1 SU and 2-2 ATS. Unders 3-1.
More NBA: On the season, faves lead 186-98 SU with 5 games closing pick-’em, but dogs improved to 145-128-11 ATS (53.1%). Home teams lead 179-110 SU and 145-133-11 ATS (52.2%). Overs' slim lead in totals wagering got even slimmer at 143-141-5 (50.4%) overall.
NHL: Faves/dogs split 4-4 with biggest upsets by Blue (+178 at Panthers) and Canucks (+165 at Golden Knights). Home/road teams also split 4-4. Unders led 4-3-1 with the push in Capitals-Devils (6). On the season, faves lead 192-139 with 8 PKs. Home teams lead 178-157 with 4 neutral-site games. Unders increased slim lead to 166-163-10.
Sunday’s NFL Best Bets
Texans +14 at Dolphins: As stated above, we’ve kind of put all our eggs in one basket with our BetsGiving plays on the Texans +14 and Texans-Dolphins Under 47, basically trusting what we believe is a correlated dog/Under parlay. More details in our original writeup below, but we’re counting on Kyle Allen to be an upgrade over Davis Mills.
Bears +7 at Jets: It’s sounding like Justin Fields won’t go for the Bears, but we’ll take the inflated line as Trevor Siemian can be serviceable at times. And we don’t get why so much respect seems to be given to Mike White replacing Zach Wilson.
Raiders +4 at Seahawks: This is a mini-swagger play with the Raiders snapping a five-game losing streak vs. the Broncos last week.
That’s it for Sunday as we’re already 2-0 ATS in NFL Week 12 with the Lions and Giants on Thanksgiving, plus our recommended teaser plays (Panthers, Titans, Eagles and Steelers) don’t have as good of numbers as earlier in the week, so we hope followers grabbed the better lines.
Welcome to our weekly Wednesday “Tuley’s Takes Today” column in which we break down the full NFL schedule. We’re coming off another winning NFL week as we won with the Titans last Thursday and the Panthers, Lions and Raiders on Sunday as well as hitting our top teaser. However, we did lose with the Cardinals on Monday Night Football to end on a sour note, but we’re back for more in NFL Week 12, starting with the Thanksgiving tripleheader on Thursday. We’ve also been hot with our daily top picks as we won with Ball State +3 in a 18-17 loss to Miami-Ohio in Tuesday night MACtion. That improved our daily Best Bets to 16-6 ATS (72.7%) the first 22 days of November, including 12-3 ATS (80%) the last 15 days. But let’s get to what everyone is here for on Wednesday. Even if I don’t have a Best Bet on a game, I’ll still give my “pool play” strategy for those who are in contests where you have to pick every game. Buffalo Bills (-10 -105) at Detroit LionsThe Bills were the Super Bowl favorites for a long time with most people saying they had the best overall team. They even ranked No. 1 in total offense and total defense earlier this season, but while they’re still No. 2 in total offense at 417.4 yards per game, the defense only ranks No. 13 as the Bills have mostly been letting teams stick around. In fact, in addition to losing two straight games earlier this month to the Jets and Vikings, the Bills’ last five games have all been one-score games. And now they face the poster child for covering as underdog: the Lions were 11-6 ATS last season despite a 3-13-1 SU record and are 6-4 ATS this year, including three straight upsets of the Packers, Bears and Giants. We gave this out at +10 at DraftKings on “The Greg Peterson Experience” on Sunday night and still love the play as double-digit dogs are 10-4 ATS so far this season.
Best Bet: Lions +10 (pool play: Lions in all my rare ATS contests that use Thanksgiving Day games while Bills in all my SU pools).
New York Giants at Dallas Cowboys (-9.5)
This is a tough choice because I usually love anytime I’m getting an NFL underdog of more than a touchdown, especially one with a winning record like the Giants (7-3). However, as we’ve written many times this season, the Giants have kind of been doing it with mirrors as they're a rather mediocre No. 19 in yards per game and No. 17 in yards allowed per game. The Cowboys won the earlier meeting 23-16 at the Meadowlands, but that was with Cooper Rush at QB and when the Giants were playing better, so I have to pass for now. Check out my Thursday column as I might end up taking the Giants if this gets to double digits.
Best Bet: Pass for now (pool play: Giants 55/45 on principle in ATS contests, but Cowboys in all my SU pools).
New England Patriots at Minnesota Vikings (-2.5 -115)
This is another game where I’ve gone back and forth on how to play it. At +3, the Patriots were tempting and are still very teasable up to +8.5 with the line at 2.5. The Vikings certainly look more vulnerable than they did a week ago after getting absolutely dominated by the Cowboys in a 40-3 rout. The Patriots’ defense – ranked No. 4 in yards allowed per game compared to the Cowboys at No. 8 – is capable of containing Kirk Cousins, who usually struggles in primetime games. However, the Vikings should be able to bounce back from that blowout loss and I’m not sure the Patriots’ offense will be able to match them score for score. This comes down to me just feeling more confident in the teaser plays on Sunday.
Best Bet: Pass (pool play: Vikings 55/45 in ATS contests and 70/30 in SU pools).
Baltimore Ravens (-4) at Jacksonville Jaguars
Here’s another case where I don’t feel like I’m getting enough points to back the underdog (note: I’ve had a lot of success this season by passing on lines that seemed too short). I mean, this is the Jaguars and they’re only getting 4 points vs. the Ravens? Does anyone give Jacksonville any points for home-field advantage? I just can’t pull the trigger.
Best Bet: Pass (pool play: Ravens 60/40 in ATS contests and 80/20 in SU pools).
Denver Broncos (-2.5) at Carolina Panthers
The Panthers have covered their last two games (a 25-15 upset vs. the Falcons in the Week 10 Thursday nighter and covering as 13-point dogs at the Ravens in a 13-3 loss) and four of their last five games. However, we have another short home dog here, but at least the Panthers are playable in 2-team, 6-point teasers, so this is a good spot to go over our teaser portfolio for the week as we’ve been killing it with these lately. In Sunday’s early games, we want to tease the Panthers up to 8.5 along with the Titans teased up from +1.5 vs. the Bengals up to +7.5. We’ll also start teasers to the Sunday and Monday night games with the Eagles -1 vs. the Packers and Steelers +8.5 at the Colts.
Best Bet: Panthers +8.5/Titans +7.5 plus other teasers (pool play: Panthers 55/45 in ATS contests but Broncos 60/40 in SU pools).
Atlanta Falcons at Washington Commanders (-4)
Believe it or not, this is an important game in the NFC playoff picture with both in the wild-card chase while the Falcons (5-6) are still trying to keep up with the Buccaneers (5-5) in the NFC South. The Commanders (6-5, 6-4-1 ATS) are coming off a 23-10 win at the Texans last week as they’re still riding high after their 32-21 upset of the previously undefeated Eagles as 11-point road underdogs on Monday Night Football in Week 10. Taylor Heinicke has held onto the starting QB job by leading Washington to a 4-1 record in Carson Wentz’s absence, including other upsets of the Packers and Colts. The Falcons have arguably been overachieving even more this season as they covered the spread in their first six games and covered after closing as 2-point home favorites in a hard-fought 27-24 win vs. the Bears this past Sunday, though earlier bettors pushed on +/- 3. This is another game where I might end up on the Falcons eventually, but my first impression is that this li ne has been shaded just a tad too low.