The Big E College Football Picks: Week 10

Congratulations to Jaylon4Heisman for leading Week 9 with 11 wins.

Our overall leader remains dudeacow who has a 4-game lead at 112-65.

LEAGUE STANDINGS

Ya boy has climbed up a little bit but still trails the upper quarter.

Big E: 8-7 (95-82 overall, 29th place)

Now for this week's picks...

No. 22 Temple (-13) at SMU

Pick: SMU

Early this season SMU was giving Baylor a game (for a bit) and it looked like Chad Morris was going to engineer a nice turn around. However, the Mustangs have only been victorious once this season.

Still, major let down factor in play here for Temple and SMU has enough offense to keep this game close. The Owls have been playing in nail biters for most of this season and I expect that to continue this weekend.

No. 16 Florida State (+12) at No. 1 Clemson 

Pick: Florida State

I'd make the case that Clemson, since they've cleaned up their offensive line issues, has been the best team in the country over the last 5 weeks. But I'm taking almost two touchdowns in a rivalry game of this magnitude.

No. 8 TCU (-5.5) at No. 14 Oklahoma State

Pick: TCU

You can't name a single player on Oklahoma State. And besides the 5 minutes you watched them play against Texas Tech last week (in which you witnessed 8 touchdowns) you have no idea how the Cowboys are 8-0 right now.

It's round one of the Big 12 playoff elimination tournament! Well, definitely for Oklahoma State if they were to lose. Maybe not so much for TCU but they'd be in trouble too.

Cincinnati (+8.5) at No. 25 Houston

Pick: Houston

Here's a sneaky big game for the playoffs, at least from Notre Dame's perspective. We need the AAC to continue fielding great teams and have those teams to lose to Navy and Temple. 
I mentioned in my Heisman post a while ago that Houston has one of the country's top dual-threat quarterbacks.

Plus, their defense is fairly legit. I don't foresee Gunner Kiel going 15 for 15 again this weekend.

No. 7 Michigan State (-5.5) at Nebraska

Pick: Michigan State

The Spartans continue to get no respect from Vegas. It's felt like MSU is due for a dumb loss at some point in the season, but when? Normally, a visit to Lincoln could be a tough game. But against THIS version of the Cornhuskers? The team that has lost 6 games already? The team that just scored a bunch of touchdowns in the 4th quarter and still lost handily to Purdue?

No way.

Navy (+8) at No. 13 Memphis

Pick: Memphis

Now the Middies enter the thick of their conference schedule beginning with the current Group of 5 darling in Memphis. This spread feels considerably low to me because the Tigers can get it done on both sides of the ball. The sharps must be thinking Memphis is going to struggle with the triple option. I still like that Tigers offense to score a bunch of points.

No. 2 LSU (+7) at No. 4 Alabama

Pick: Alabama

Does it smell like 2011 up in here or what? Man, the SEC doesn't win a National Championship for a couple years and all of a sudden this game feels refreshingly new.

The last time I was really sure Alabama was going to win was when they were ultimately up-ended by Ole Miss. I'm feeling like they might make a statement this weekend and move into position for the SEC Title Game, pending a future loss by Ole Miss. So I'm going against my 'take the points' rule in big matchups against highly rated SEC teams. No doubt, I'll regret this decision.