2025 College Football Preseason Picks (Part 4)

Intro

This is the last post in my preseason bets series for now. I’ve covered 7 FBS conferences so far, and today I’ll finish it off with the Sun Belt, Conference USA and the MAC.

No sportsbook has listed odds to make/miss the playoff yet. Once these lines are listed, I’ll likely be back with another post with some picks on those lines.

Sun Belt

Troy over 5.5 wins -115 (2 units)

Troy to win the Sun Belt +1500 (1 unit)

First time HC Gerad Parker took over the Troy job last year, and the Trojans slipped from 11-3 to 4-8. While this looks like a pretty big disappointment on the surface, there were reasons for optimism. Troy got unlucky, going 0-3 in close games. Almost no one returned from the 2023 squad, and they were figuring things out at the beginning of the season. They got a lot better as the season went along, going 3-1 down the stretch with two wins over bowl teams.

Troy is a great bounce back candidate this year because (i) last year was not as bad as it looked, (ii) they have some stability and decent returning production numbers and (iii) they recruit better than most teams in the Sun Belt. They have a much stronger winning tradition than other teams in the league, and this shows in their roster which I rank fourth in the Sun Belt in talent. Parker should get them back to a bowl this year.

James Madison to win the Sun Belt +400 (2 units)

James Madison was the best team in the Sun Belt last year but only went 4-4 in conference play. Many of their losses were in ridiculous fashion- they dominated ULM but lost thanks to awful red zone luck, they lost to Marshall in 2OT, and so on. I was in attendance when they hung 70 on UNC in Chapel Hill, and that was more emblematic of their season- at their best, they looked like the best G5 team not named Boise State.

HC Bob Chesney is in his second year in Harrisonburg after previous HC Curt Cignetti left for Indiana. Cignetti took a lot of his guys with him to Bloomington, and Chesney did a great job navigating that. Chesney came from Holy Cross, and is reunited with his former Holy Cross QB in Matt Sluka (who you may recall from his opt out at UNLV last year). I really like the idea of a QB and coach reunited- that has been a winning formula in the G5 in recent years.

James Madison has the most talented roster in the Sun Belt and perhaps the best QB as well. They are the clear favorites to win the Sun Belt and should be better than +400 to win the league. I might add a fraction of a unit on them to make the playoff at 40/1 or so when those lines get listed later this summer- I really like their upside.

Conference USA

Western Kentucky under 7.5 wins -125 (3 units)

This bet pains me as a self-avowed WKU fan. However, all signs point down for the Hilltoppers in 2025. Last year’s team was OK, going 8-6 and losing the CUSA championship game. They were a bit worse than their record indicated, suffering a few blowout losses, most notably in the CUSA title game to Jacksonville State. The big problem is that absolutely no one is back from that team. WKU got destroyed in the portal, and is in the bottom five in FBS in returning production. Former WKU OC Zach Kittley got the FAU job and took QB Caden Veltkamp with him, along with several other key players.

HC Tyson Helton clearly saw the writing on the wall for this year’s squad as his name was linked to a million jobs last offseason. However, he wasn’t able to land any of them, and that means he’ll have to attend to this mess. His strategy has been to bring in portal QBs, and while he’s had success with this in the past, I don’t like any of his options this year. This team is going to be super inexperienced in an improving CUSA.

New Mexico State over 4.5 wins -150 (2 units)

You may recall in my previous post that I’m betting on New Mexico under 3.5 wins this year. On the other side of the state, I like their rivals in Las Cruces this year.

I called New Mexico one of the most woebegone programs in FBS in that article. The same thing certainly applies to New Mexico State. The difference here is that NMSU has two things UNM does not- some roster stability and a quarterback. NMSU brought in Montana QB Logan Fife, who was a good FCS QB on a playoff team.

Most importantly, New Mexico State plays a pillow-soft schedule this year. Half their schedule is against teams that are either FCS or in the bottom 10 of FBS. There might be some Texas high school teams that could go over 4.5 wins against this schedule.

MAC

Ohio to win the MAC +250 (1 unit)

The MAC has really fallen into irrelevance since COVID. There hasn’t been a MAC team challenging for the top of the G5 since PJ Fleck’s Western Michigan team nearly a decade ago.

Throughout the irrelevance, there are two teams in the MAC that have built rosters better than the rest of the league- Toledo and Ohio. Ohio finally broke through after years of near-misses and won the MAC last year. While they did lose HC Tim Albin to Charlotte, they were able to keep a decent amount of their roster together. All of the second tier teams in the MAC (Northern Illinois, Bowling Green, Miami (OH)) were absolutely eviscerated in the portal. This leaves Ohio and Toledo as the serious contenders for the league title, and I like Ohio a bit better.