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Rice Owls at Western Kentucky Hilltoppers The Rice Owls (0-0) will travel to Bowling Green, Kentucky to face off with the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers (0-0) scheduled for an 8:00 kick-off at L.T. Smith Stadium to start the 2016-17 College Football season for both clubs. The odds maker has WKU as a large -16.5 point spread favorite for this game with a total line of 63. Western Kentucky comes in as defending Conference-USA champion playing host to downtrodden Rice, a team hoping to piece together a winning season after they failed to make a bowl game in 2015. The big headline with the Hilltoppers is how they will cope transitioning in to the post-Brandon Doughty era, as Coach Jeff Brohm will look to find ways to curate the success WKU enjoyed on offense while they had one of the most prolific passers in the history of the NCAA at the helm. Their first test comes against this Rice team that will look to replenish a methodical offense that stalled when it was needed to produce most. With Western Kentucky replacing 11 starters on an already porous defense, the Owls should have plenty of opportunities to work out their kinks.
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Straight Up and Against the Point Spread Records
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<p><strong>Rice Owls</strong> 0-0, 0-0<br />
<strong>Western Kentucky Hilltoppers</strong> 0-0, 0-0</p>
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Rankings
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<p><strong>Rice:</strong> NR<br />
<strong>Western Kentucky:</strong> NR</p>
<div class="heading">Key Betting Trends</div>
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Rice is 1-4-1 ATS in their last six contests dating back to 2015.
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Western Kentucky is 4-0 ATS in their last four games overall.
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Western Kentucky is 5-1 ATS in their last six games at home dating back to 2015.
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<div class="heading">
Public Money
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66% of the consensus is going with the Hilltoppers, as the line itself raised by 1.5 points since the open of the market. No Moneyline has been established as of now, while 75% of the money is on the over for an Over/Under set at 63. Western Kentucky lived and died by their offense in 2015. Western Kentucky bolstered some incredible performance accolades as they compiled over 40 points in 10 of their 14 fixtures last season. Incidentally, WKU’s defense gave up 28 points more in 10 of these same 14 contests last year as well. Western Kentucky is a team that had the luxury of being lax on defense, knowing their offense will pick up whatever slack was needed. However, this same outfit now will not be equipped with such commodities. Now, the Hilltoppers will have to find answers to quell a Rice rushing attack that was the second-best in 2015 within the Conference-USA as the Owls compiled over 177 yards per game on the ground.
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