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The Washington vs. California betting line has the Golden Bears as a -4 point favorite for Friday night’s College Football. You can bet this game at Sportsbook.com here and receive up to $250 in FREE CASH upon joining.
Sportsbook.ag Line & Total: California -4 & 51.5
Opening Line & Total: Bears -4 & 52.5
Pac-12 foes desperately needing a win to bolster their bowl chances meet Friday night when Washington visits California.
After losing six of seven meetings from 2002-2008, Washington has won three straight against Cal. This includes last year’s 31-23 Huskies victory behind a monster day from QB Keith Price (19-of-25, 292 yards, 3 TD). That contributed to Price’s school record 33 TD in 2011, but he has just 8 TD and 9 INT this year. The Bears have been outscored 70 to 30 with six turnovers during a two-game losing skid. This included a 21-3 loss to Stanford in their last home game two weeks ago when they were outrushed 252 to 3. Although the Bears are just 1-4 ATS at home this season, they usually shine at Memorial Stadium, going 21-10 ATS (68%) at home since 2008. They are also profitable when pegged as a moderate favorite, with Jeff Tedford posting a 24-11 ATS mark (69%) as a favorite of 3.5 to 10 points as Cal's coach.
Washington's offense has been terrible this season for the most part, ranking 97th in the nation in rushing offense (126 YPG) and 95th in passing offense (196 YPG). Price has been awful in his three road games this year (LSU, Oregon and Arizona), completing 65-of-121 passes (53.7%) for 558 yards (4.6 YPA), 1 TD and 5 INT. He did play pretty well in last week's home win over a tough Oregon State team though, completing 18-of-30 passes for 194 yards and 1 INT in the 20-17 victory. RB Bishop Sankey has had a nice year running the football (83 rush YPG, 5th in Pac-12), but he has also been a valuable receiver in the past three weeks, with catching 12 passes. The offense will continue to revolve around him. Defensively, the Huskies rarely venture into the opposing backfield (1.4 sacks per game, 4.4 Tackles For Loss per game), but they have held four opponents to 17 points or less, including Oregon State last week.
Cal QB Zach Maynard (227 passing YPG, 12 TD, 9 INT) kept his team in the game in Seattle last year by completing 23-of-43 passes for 349 yards, 1 TD and 0 INT. He is also coming off a great effort in Utah, completing 20-of-32 passes for 288 yards, 2 TD and 1 INT. The Bears run the football with three different players, all who have been very effective at times. C.J. Anderson (513 rush yds, 4 TD) has just 10 carries for 15 yards in the past two games and Isi Sofele (477 rush yds, 2 TD) is averaging just 36 rushing YPG in the past four weeks, but Brendan Bigelow (343 rush yds, 3 TD) could be in for a bigger role considering his impressive 125 yards on just 12 carries over the past three games. Defensively, Cal is averaging a solid 2.6 sacks per game with 12 interceptions, but the team is still surrendering 417 total YPG, which includes 164.2 yards on the ground and 252.4 yards through the air.
- Carrie Stroup, Gambling911.com Senior Reporter
