Hawaii vs Arizona: Las Vegas Odds on Saturday’s Opener in Halawa

I’ve enjoyed covering Hawaii football every so often, and I’m intrigued to see the pregame, live-betting, and outcome-stages of how Las Vegas handles a very early “Week 1” meeting between the Mountain West and the Pac-12 on a Halawa gridiron.

But as a prediction blogger I can’t overlook the reality of the day-to-day gridiron bettor. All too often, we get caught up in making wager-recommendations that may be valuable-enough, but lose sight of the likely practical outcome. For instance a 50-to-1 FCS underdog that’s really a 25-to-1 underdog might be a nice 1-unit wager for the career handicapper…but there’s still a 24-out-of-25 probability that a bloke making a 1-off gamble will lose on it.

On Saturday night, Hawaii will once again be the “bailout game” mecca of the state-side betting community when it hosts Arizona for dog-days opener. It would be irresponsible to overlook that element and skip right to the pigskin. Halawa’s status as the most westerly campus in the FBS (and the fact that – thankfully – prep football from Alaska is not yet widely gambled on) means that bettors in dire straits after a losing Saturday often wager on the Rainbow Warriors to win or lose ATS, hoping for a big turn-around winner to help them break even on the weekend.

Pregame action – or pre-Saturday-after-the-Miami-vs-Florida-game action anyway – should be taken with a grain of salt. Unless you are curious of how the lines might move when desperate players get hold of the markets – in that case we have to handicap the public’s opinion along with the ‘Warriors and visiting Wildcats.

Who: Arizona Wildcats at Hawaii Rainbow Warriors

When: Saturday, August 24th, 10:30 PM EST

Where: Aloha Stadium, Halawa, HI

Lines: Arizona (-13) at Hawaii (+13) / O/U Total: (74)

Hawaii vs Arizona: Handicapping Saturday’s Bailout Game ATS

Kevin Sumlin returns after a lackluster 5-7 debut season with the Arizona Wildcats. Kahlil “I Didn’t Come Here to Run Tripple Opshun” Tate and his custom-order playbook produced a lot of exciting highlights and few clutch moments in the 2nd half.

RB J.J. Taylor has been sensational for the squad, however, producing 1,434 yards last season. There will be considerable pressure on Taylor to produce due to an inexperienced wideout group and the athletic Tate’s 1-trick-pony downside.

Prospects could be brighter on defense, where junior linebacker Colin Schooler is coming off a monster 2018 season with 119 tackles, 21.5 tackles for loss, and 3.5 sacks. Tony Fields II is another fierce defender patrolling the middle of the field – excuse the pun.

Hawaii was a revelation in the 1st half of 2018, threatening school records on offense behind sophomore QB Cole MacDonald after being written-off by pundits (and bookmakers) in the 2017-18 offseason.

Too many handicappers are short-order historians, using last season’s results to gauge Week 1 of the following campaign. But any rub from ’18 Hawaii’s lines might have gotten was gone following a slump in autumn.

How will it look on the island gridiron this time ’round? MacDonald is back, and even the colorful Eric Townsend of Arizona’s Fansided page thinks the junior could have more help than anticipated:

Cole McDonald most notably returns for the Warriors, as the redshirt junior quarterback threw for over 3,800 yards with 36 touchdowns to just 10 interceptions last season. He will once again undoubtedly lead a potent offense that will challenge the Wildcats, and he’s probably Hawaii’s best player.

It’s also worth noting, that Hawaii returns their entire offensive line (and may have former Wildcat Michael Eletise immediately eligible following his transfer to Hawaii). Additionally, the Warriors return a majority of their offensive production last season, as guys like Cedric Byrd and JoJo Ward are going to challenge Arizona’s defense immensely, and they of course can’t forget a diverse player like Freddie Holly out of the back field!

Defensively, Hawaii was a bit of a mess last season, but they definitely have some talent and return a lot of players from last season, a lot of them upperclassmen!

For an Arizona beat reporter he’s pretty excited about the Rainbow Warriors’ defense. Maybe he just wants to see a really good game in the 1st week. Lord knows we’ve all seen some lousy ones.

Picking Arizona at Hawaii ATS and on the Over/Under Total

Finally it’s worth mentioning that the Over/Under total is soaring to (74) points. Typically the underdog is associated with the “under,” as in an illegal “correlated” parlay of the ‘dog moneyline plus the low side of the O/U. Gamblers seem to think Hawaii will score its share of points and that the scrum could be a total shoot-out. I tend to agree, but is Hawaii really a 13-point underdog if the scoring gets wild?

Heck, that would be right in a Run-and-Shoot home team’s wheelhouse. Arizona’s best chance to prevail is actually to slow the tempo down and try to out-body punch the lighter MWC side for 4 quarters. If there’s a rapid-fire air show on Saturday night, the local hero QB will be licking his chops.

Is it Power-5 bias or plain name-recognition at work in the odds? Who cares. Arizona is getting overvalued and overpriced either way.

Take Hawaii to cover (+13) points…whether you’re bailing out or just cashing-in.

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