Birmingham Bowl: East Carolina vs. Coastal Carolina College Football 2022 Best Bets & Predictions (Tuesday)
Check out Thor Nystrom’s best bets for this week’s college football bowl games. And here’s a closer look at the Birmingham Bowl.
2022 regular season: 82-66-3 ATS (55.4%)
2022 bowls (through Dec. 25): 14-4-1 ATS (77.8%)
2022 combined: 96-70-4 ATS (57.8%)
2014-2021: 706-620-17 ATS (53.2%)
Birmingham Bowl: East Carolina vs. Coastal Carolina College Football 2022 Best Bets & Predictions
Tuesday, December 27 | 5:45 PM
East Carolina (-7) vs. Coastal Carolina | Total: 62.5
ATL: ECU -5.8 | ATT: 63
East Carolina
- QB Bryce Carpenter (Suspension)
- OC Willie Lampkin (Transfer portal)
- DE Josaiah Stewart (Transfer portal)
- CB Manny Stokes (Transfer portal)
- CB Zxaequan Reeves (Transfer portal)
- S Dre Pinckney (Injury/Portal)
QB Grayson McCall is in the transfer portal - but in a surprising twist, McCall announced he would play in the bowl game before transferring. McCall returned from a foot injury to start in the Sun Belt title game but clearly wasn't 100% in that game. If he's indeed playing in the bowl, the extra three-and-a-half weeks to heal will likely do the foot some good. McCall has been named the Sun Belt's Player of the Year in three-straight seasons. The drop-off between McCall and QB3 Jarrett Guest is the largest in the nation from a point-spread perspective. QB2 Carpenter is suspended due to an off-field incident.
McCall playing in the bowl is good news for Coastal. The bad news is that the Chants won't be at full strength regardless.
OC Lampkin was a first-team All-Sun Belt selection who figures to be looking to move up to the P5. Coastal's backup center took only 18 snaps. Lampkin was easily the team's best offensive lineman. Without Lampkin, who transferred to UNC, Coastal Carolina will start an offensive line where none of the five starters had a PFF grade of even 65.0.
DE Stewart and CB Stokes were both contributors on defense. Stewart will particularly be missed after he logged 10 TFL during the regular season - he was the team's best pass rusher. Stewart has signed with Michigan.
Coastal Carolina
- RB Rahjai Harris (Injury)
- TE Ryan Jones (Opt-out)
- C Avery Jones (Transfer portal)
- EDGE Elijah Robinson (Transfer portal)
- S Shawn Dourseau (Transfer portal)
TE Jones' pass-catching ability will be missed against a rancid Coastal Carolina pass defense. He had a disappointing season, but there's a qualitative drop-off to his backup nonetheless.
OC Jones was another starter. ECU's backup center only was on the field for nine snaps this season. S Dourseau was a part-timer who logged 227 snaps.
Platoon RB Harris was knocked out for the season in October. EDGE Robinson was a little-used backup.
Coaching News
Coastal Carolina HC Jamey Chadwell accepted the same position at Liberty and will not coach in this game. The Chants hired NC State OC Tim Beck to replace Chadwell, but he will not coach in this game. Coastal named DC Chad Staggs interim coach for the bowl.
Handicap
Assuming Coastal Carolina QB Grayson McCall is playing - and he's been emphatic that he is - this spread remains a little inflated. The market agrees with me. It has dropped from ECU -8.5 to ECU -7 in the past four days.
Both of these teams have rancid pass defenses. And both passing offenses are extremely dangerous.
The biggest issue for Coastal in this handicap becomes that while ECU is pass-first, CCU in the regular season wanted to establish the run. The Chants had a top-40 run rate on both standard and passing downs.
That's the part that's going to be an issue for Coastal, here. ECU has a really good front-seven and a really good run defense in general. The latter ranks No. 35 success rate and No. 6 in explosion.
ECU will successfully shut down CCU's run game. Coastal's offensive line was bad before and will be worse after OC Lampkin's opt-out. But ECU has one of the nation's worst pass defenses (No. 120 success rate) - McCall and crew are going to slice that up as often as the play-callers will dial it up.
There's less of a question of ECU leaning into CCU's defensive weakness. ECU is already a pass-first team, and a strong one at that - ECU's passing attack ranks No. 25 in success rate. Meanwhile, CCU's pass defense is an abomination, ranking No. 108 success rate and No. 125 explosion.
But in a reality where both teams threw roughly the same amount of times, this game would be close to a coin flip. And with a new staff in for Coastal, I'm banking on the interim brass allowing McCall to go out with a bang against ECU's feeble secondary.
I'm taking ECU to win, but Coastal to stay within this bloated number.
The pick: Coastal Carolina +7
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