Last season the Ohio Bobcats went on a magical run through the conference tournament and into the second round of the NCAA Tourney, ending at the hands ofTennessee with a trip to the Sweet 16 on the line. Kent State, with six seniors on its roster, blew through the regular season and had the top seed in the conference tournament, but faltered against the Bobcats. Who will play the role of the regular season bully this season? Who, if anyone, will go on an amazing post-season run? There are quite a few question marks in the MAC East as the season begins.

Kent, with 20 wins or more in 11 of the last 12 seasons, is as unknown as everyone else. When you lose six seniors you have quite a bit of work to do. Ohio was chosen by the media as the top team in the East this season, but what will the Bobcats do to replace the high-scoring Armon Bassett?

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Sometimes even when you tie, you lose. I suffered that particular sports wagering axiom last weekend as I correctly picked three games, missed on three games and ended up down $25 because of the vig. Something about that just does not feel right, but like my sports junkie cousin told me many years ago, “bookies are bookies because they make money. If they lost money they would not be bookies.” So my imaginary bookie took me for an imaginary 25 bucks. And I only have three games on the board this week to get my payback.

For those that are unfamiliar with this particular weekly column, I started midway through the MAC season with a fictional $1,000 to bet on MAC football games. And, week after week, I make my selections and put some of this fictional money down on the games. Prior to last week I was down to $820, but my $25 loss last week dropped the kitty down to $795. Here are my selections for this week:

Akron (+13.5) at Ball State – The Zips are having huge problems getting first-year head coach Rob Ianello’s system down and were blown out last week at Temple. With a rough schedule the rest of the way this is probably Akron’s last legitimate chance to get a win. Ball State is not a bad football team, but the Cardinals have been very inconsistent this season. Akron will remain winless, but they will probably win with the spread.

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Saturday afternoon Western Michigan and Northern Illinois played in a classic football game that had huge conference championship implications. The game, televised locally on a network channel, was as big as it gets as far as Mid-American Conference football is concerned. Northern Illinois, riding a five-game winning streak traveled to Western Michigan to take on the Broncos in Waldo Stadium. Western needed a win to stay in the MAC West championship hunt.

Watching the opening kickoff, and seeing the far stands at Waldo Stadium as the football flew through the air, the wind came out of my sails.

A game this big with so much on the line, and the stands looked like an afternoon Cleveland Senate League football contest…nothing but metal stands against the white backdrop of painted concrete. If there were more than 200 people in the far stands this writer will eat his well-worn Cincinnati Reds baseball cap.

Broncos fans, you missed a great football game. You missed an incredible show by one of your fifth-year seniors, Jordan White…a player that has fought back from missing two entire seasons with injuries to become one of the best, if not most overlooked, players in the conference. He is the type of player fans should root for and invest some emotion in; he deserved so much more than just a handful of people in the stands to see him go off with 14 receptions for 180 yards and a touchdown.

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Looking over this weekend’s slate of Mid-American Conference football games there really are not one or two games that stand out to me from a wagering perspective. In fact, if I were to set my own lines for these games everything would probably look relatively the same. When I was in school that was how I would choose what games I would wager on…after looking through the schedule I would put down numbers I thought were reasonable on each game. Then compare my numbers to the actual betting lines. If there was a big discrepancy on any of the games, that was where my wager would usually go.

Well, that technique did not work very well last weekend as the final verdict looked as such: two wins, five losses. The fictional $1,000 I started with is down to $820 so I better pick some winners this week.

Again, remember, this is for entertainment purposes only.

Northern Illinois -8 at Western Michigan: This is a bigger game for Western than it is for the Huskies, and it is being played at Waldo Stadium in Kalamazoo. However, the Broncos just don’t have the horses or front seven on defense to stop Chandler Harnish and Chad Spann. WMU is ninth in the conference in rushing defense, and though the Broncos score a lot of points the Northern Illinois defense is probably the most overlooked part of the most solid football team in the MAC. The Huskies are tops in the conference in total offense and third in total defense, behind Kent State and Ohio University. Though the crowd will be up for this one and the stakes are very high for the Broncos, I am going with Northern Illinois to cover.

The wager: $100 on Northern Illinois (-8)

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