Bodog Beat

Georgia Tech's Jonathan Dwyer will no doubt be a threat tonight against Miami. (AP Images)

In my humble opinion, the NCAA college football betting game of the weekend doesn't take place on Saturday but on Thursday night, when No. 14 Georgia Tech visits No. 20 Miami in an important early-season ACC matchup – the Hurricanes are 6-point favorites on Bodog (that number has moved substantially toward Miami in the past 48 hours).

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Live football betting on No. 14 Georgia Tech at No. 20 Miami starts tonight.

My reasons?

First of all, this is only one of two games involving a pair of ranked teams this entire week, and the other is a non-conference game on Saturday featuring Nebraska and Virginia Tech. Secondly, the Tech-UM matchup gives one of the two an important tiebreaker in the Coastal Division, not to mention a 2-0 ACC start when most other teams haven't even played a conference game yet.

Let's get right down to the basics of Thursday's game: Miami holds the Georgia Tech running game to a respectable number and wins a second straight game against a ranked ACC foe, or the Jackets do something similar to last season's 472 yards rushing against the Canes and win their fifth straight game in this series – and third in a row in South Florida.

Football is never as simple as the paragraph stated above, but it almost is when facing the Georgia Tech triple-option. If the Jackets can't run, they aren't going to win. And after seeing Jackets QB Josh Nesbitt go 3-for-14 passing for 83 yards with two picks in last Thursday's win against Clemson, the Hurricanes will absolutely dare him to beat them through the air. Thus Miami will focus most of its efforts on reigning ACC Offensive Player of the Year Jonathan Dwyer, who rushed for 128 yards and two touchdowns on 10 carries in just the first half of last year's 41-23 Georgia Tech win.

"We got to take out Dwyer," UM defensive line coach Clint Hurtt said to reporters.

Indeed, Miami head coach Randy Shannon said his team needs to limit Dwyer's biggest gain of the night to about 12 yards. Last year, he had a 58-yard scoring run against Miami and added a 74-yard TD run on his first carry of this season in Tech's opener against Jacksonville State.

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As for the Hurricanes, their passing offense looked stellar behind sophomore QB Jacory Harris (386 yards passing) in their upset at Florida State last Monday, and they do have the benefit of 10 days to prepare, while Georgia Tech is playing its third game in less than two weeks. Having extra time to prepare for the Jackets' unique offense can’t be overstated. Just ask Clemson, which only had a few days last week and found itself down 24-0 rather quickly.

Miami also will welcome back a key defensive player on Thursday night: starting defensive end Eric Moncur, who sat out the FSU win with a groin injury, will play. However, wide receiver Aldarius Johnson (groin) is listed as questionable and will likely be a game-time decision. That would be a significant loss. The Jackets are pretty healthy.

Georgia Tech leads the all-time series 10-4. If the Yellow Jackets lead Thursday's game at the half, Miami is in trouble because Tech is 9-1 when ahead entering intermission under coach Paul Johnson.

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