One more win should put the Cincinnati Bearcats in the College Football Playoff. Cincinnati has been No. 4 in the CFP Rankings for the last few weeks, as their road win over 11-1 Notre Dame has looked better and better. The Bearcats are poised to become the first Group of Five team to make the CFP, but they must take down the Houston Cougars in the AAC Championship Game on Saturday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The AAC Championship Game will feature the Cincinnati Bearcats hosting the Houston Cougars at Nippert Stadium in Cincy on Saturday, December 4, 2021, at 4 p.m. ET on ABC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
College Football Betting Odds<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Cincinnati -10<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Houston +10<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Total 52.5<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The Bearcats proved they were for real early this season by going on the road to beat Notre Dame 24-13 in South Bend. Cincinnati had some hiccups in AAC play in October, but this team rallied in November and closed out the year with three straight blowout victories<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Houston has flown under the radar for most of the year. The Cougars lost their season opener to Texas Tech, but they have since won 11 straight games. They have scored at least 31 points in eight straight games coming into the AAC Championship Game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When Cincinnati Has the Ball<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Desmond Ridder saved his best for last at Cincinnati. Ridder is completing 66% of his passes for 3,000 yards with 27 touchdowns and eight interceptions this season. He is the second leading rusher on the team too with 342 yards and six touchdowns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jerome Ford has run for 1,055 yards and 17 touchdowns this season. Ford is averaging 5.8 YPC as Cincinnati\u2019s primary running back. The Bearcats have one elite receiver in Alec Pierce too. Pierce has 48 receptions for 802 yards and seven scores on the year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Houston has one of the best defenses in the country. The Cougars are allowing just 307.5 YPG, and they rank 15th<\/sup> in Defensive SP+. They rank in the top 20 in run defense and pass defense, and they are in the top ten in havoc stats (sacks and interceptions) too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When Houston Has the Ball<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Clayton Tune threw four interceptions against Texas Tech in the season opener, but he has been superb the rest of the season. Tune has thrown 24 touchdowns and four interceptions in the last 11 games, spurring the Cougars on their win streak. He was vital to their shootout wins over SMU and South Florida, and he torched Connecticut in the season finale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The go-to receiver on Houston is Nathaniel Dell. He has 71 receptions for 1,027 yards and 11 touchdowns. Alton McCaskill is averaging 5.2 YPC with 16 touchdowns as the top running back, and he should be able to eclipse 1,000 yards before the end of the season provided he plays in the bowl game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cincinnati is allowing just 16.5 PPG and 307.8 YPG. The secondary is arguably the best in college football with three solid cornerbacks. The Bearcats are allowing just 4.2 yards per play, but they have had a little trouble with mobile quarterbacks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Prediction<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Although Houston is a good team, Cincinnati is on a mission. The Bearcats know that a win should punch their ticket<\/a> to the CFP, and there are no focus issues with Luke Fickell staying on the sidelines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Follow our <\/em>Twitter account<\/em><\/a> for the latest sports news and wagering odds, and come to<\/em> our <\/em>Instagram<\/em><\/a> for more useful betting info too.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" One more win should put the Cincinnati Bearcats in the College Football Playoff. Cincinnati has been No. 4 in the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":14470,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[133],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ncaaf"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20218"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20218\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20227,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20218\/revisions\/20227"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.betonline.ag\/news-room\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}