While Notre Dame still has to deal with Stanford this week before it can turn its appention to BYU, oddsmakers don't have the same limitations. Those same oddsmakers are looing ahead to October 17 and see a Fighting Irish team set to log yet another double-digit victory, this time over a Top 10 team.
According to FanDuel, Marcus Freeman's squad is favored by 12.5 points over the Cougars. That spread was surprisingly even bigger on Wednesday, before the news that BYU star running back LJ Martin will miss the game against the Irish with a "lower-body injury."
With BYU's best offensive weapon out of the game against Notre Dame, this spread could grow quite a bit. Of course, since it opened so big, it's possible that as more people start playing this game more, everything will even out in the wash.
Notre Dame is currently on a 15-game streak of wins by double-digit spreads. It seems more than a little likely that the streak will sit at 16 after this weekend's game against Stanford. With the Irish nearly 40-point favorites over the Cardinal, it would be an incredibly poorly played game if the Golden Domers didn't win by 10 points.
Notre Dame football gets commanding early spread over BYU with LJ Martin sidelined
With Martin down, the only chance the Cougars seemingly have to hang with Notre Dame is to play some incredible defense. That is of course possible, as the Big 12 team has one of the best units in the country. There are even some analysts who believe the Irish defense falls short of what the Cougars have to offer on that side of the ball.
Of course, with several weeks to go until Notre Dame meets BYU in Provo, many things can change, included how big a favorite the Irish are over the Cougars. For now, a game that is considered one of the toughest on the schedule for the Golden Domers isn't looking like the oddsmakers believe it will be that difficult after all.
“Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.”
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