Boston College at Central Florida: 5 big questions

After last week’s poor effort by Boston College, I’m sure Eagles fans have many questions about what awaits the team this week as they head to Central Florida for their first away game of the season. Let’s jump right in:

5.) Seven-point underdogs: fair or an overreaction?

I am on record as having said I expected Vegas to set a line about that big, for better or worse, given the horrible things UCF did to FCS team Charleston Southern last Saturday, and how ineffective the Eagles were on the whole against Northwestern. Some have questioned, however, whether or not being +7 in this game is fair.

First, remember, it’s just a point spread; it doesn’t mean anything. Second, regardless of the spread, I do think Boston College deserves to be the underdog in this game. If you’re of the opinion that BC should be favored in this game, especially due to the conventional wisdom of ACC > C-USA, then I think you need to step back and take more honest appraisals of BC and UCF.

At this juncture, Central Florida is probably a little better than Boston College. They’re coming off of an effortless win, which may have them ill-prepared for this game (as opposed to the Eagles who aren’t), but we know of several big problems the Eagles had last week. We don’t know any of UCF’s flaws, whatever they may or may not be, because playing an FCS team won’t exactly expose them (unless you’re really quite awful). Further, this is a team which just won a conference championship and boasts talent on both sides of the ball. We know the Eagles have talent, but so far this year, we’ve only seen bits and pieces of it shining through, while some of it fell flat on its face.

I personally believe BC is more like +3 or +4 to UCF at this juncture, and +7 is a tiny bit of an overreaction, but I can somewhat understand why the spread is that big.