Texas A&M vs. North Carolina Predictions, Odds

• January 2, 2021
• By Joe Nelson
• VegasInsider.com

The final bowl game before the College Football Playoff Championship is a great one as the last team left out of the tournament faces off with a team that went toe-to-toe with two of the finalists the past two seasons.

Here is a look at the Saturday night Orange Bowl between North Carolina and Texas A&M.

Orange Bowl Betting Resources

• Bowl Matchup: SEC vs. ACC
• Expert Picks: Vegas Insiders
• Venue: Hard Rock Stadium
• Location: Miami Gardens, Florida
• Date: Saturday, Jan. 2, 2021
• Time: 8:00 p.m. ET
• TV: ESPN
• Bet: BetMGM | BetRivers | FanDuel | PointsBet | All

Orange Bowl Betting Odds

Line Movements

• Spread: Texas A&M -7.5
• Money-Line: Texas A&M -280 North Carolina +240
• Total: 65.5

Odds Subject to Change

How to Handicap Texas A&M vs. North Carolina

The last team left out of the College Football Playoff can be a risky bowl performer.

The #5 team in the final rankings has gone 2-4 S/U (3-3 ATS) in its bowl games in the playoff era with a couple of notable disastrous performances with Iowa getting blown out in the 2016 Rose Bowl and Georgia losing as a double-digit favorite in the 2019 Sugar Bowl.

Georgia was #5 last season and won and covered in its bowl game but that was not a team that had any realistic hope of making the playoff, like Texas A&M seemed to have this season.

While no one that tracks and pays attention to how the playoff rankings have been handled in the past six years thought the Aggies had a chance, the team certainly seemed to think they were in the mix, even if some of it was campaigning and posturing from head coach Jimbo Fisher.

While they had an ally in that narrative in the most prominent head coach in the ACC, drawing a team from the ACC conference that got two teams in the field should likely provide some extra motivation for the Aggies.

Upon its announcement this game was one of the most appealing from a fan’s perspective with two successful offensive teams and two high profile coaches meeting in a primetime game. North Carolina is not going to have its full complement of stars however with significant opt outs in the days leading up to this game.

The Tar Heels will not have their top three running backs nor their top receiver. That has pushed this line upward, but we’ve seen in recent days that shorthanded squads aren’t necessarily play against teams as Texas delivered a convincing bowl win despite personnel losses and a major line move the other way.

This game features two high profile coaches with a great track record of success, particularly in bowl games. Two star quarterbacks with possible NFL futures will also be on display for an appealing finish to the New Year’s Bowl weekend.

Coaching Log

Mack Brown has revived the Tar Heels in his return to Chapel Hill the past two years. The 15-9 record is not overwhelming, but this has been an exciting team that has posted nearly 43 points per game this season.

Brown has won nearly two thirds of his games as a college head coach in nearly 400 games logged. He is 14-8 in bowl games and 13-5 in his last 18 bowl games after a 1-3 start in his career. Last season the Tar Heels put on a show with a 55-13 win in the Military Bowl over Temple.

The Tar Heels did not have to play Clemson this year, but they famously played right with the Tigers last season in a 21-20 defeat, coming up short going for two late in the game.

This season North Carolina did play Notre Dame and looked the part in a competitive game that felt much closer than the 14-point final margin. That is the largest margin of defeat for Brown in his two years back with North Carolina and the only loss by more than seven points.

Jimbo Fisher is 108-33 as a college head coach at Florida State and Texas A&M yet he entered this season on the hot seat after a fourth-place finish in the SEC West last season. Fisher has won both of his bowl games with the Aggies and is 7-2 in his career in bowl games including the 2013 BCS national title.

Only once in now 11 seasons as a head coach has his team failed to win at least eight games and only once has his squad had a losing conference record. Last year’s bowl win was a narrow win over Oklahoma State, but the Aggies blasted NC State from the ACC in its 2018 Gator Bowl win.

Fisher won the 2013 Orange Bowl at the end of the 2012 season the year before the national title run while this will be the first time Brown has coached in the Orange Bowl, having coached in three Rose Bowls, three Cotton Bowls and a Fiesta Bowl.

With Texas, Brown was a national champion in the 2005 season while also getting to the BCS Championship in the 2009 season as the credentials on the sidelines are impressive in this game.

Veteran coach Mack Brown has brought stability to UNC and the school should be ready to go in Saturday's bowl matchup. (AP)

Quarterback Corner

Many project QB Sam Howell as the #1 overall pick in the 2022 NFL draft as the sophomore has been incredibly impressive from day one with the Tar Heels. He will not match last season’s touchdown count of 38 but he has 27 touchdowns this season with only six interceptions while he has a chance to pass last season’s yardage total. He has greatly improved his numbers overall jumping to a 69 percent completion rate while adding 2.0 yards per attempt to his season average.

Howell will be the team’s leading available rusher in this game even with a modest total of only 121 yards this season. 1,000-yard rushers Michael Carter and Javonte Williams have both opted out of this game while promising freshman D.J. Jones is injured.

The top receiver for the Tar Heels is Dyami Brown, who has also opted to skip this game to prepare for the NFL draft. NFL scouts will get a look at how Howell can handle a less polished group of skill players on the fly this week, perhaps mirroring the situation he will likely have if he joins one of the bottom teams in the NFL.

Aggies senior Kellen Mond rose to prominence in 2018 but his numbers did not improve much last season. He delivered a fine campaign this year to put himself in the mix to be a mid-to-late round NFL draft pick, posting great efficiency this season with only three interceptions in 271 attempts.

The Aggies were not the big play offense that the Tar Heels can be but Mond had his best performance in the spotlight with the October upset of Florida. He played reasonably well in the loss to Alabama but did have a bad outing in the narrow win over LSU late in the season and had one of his interceptions in the finale vs. Tennessee.

Mond has rushed for 258 yards this season on 4.1 yards per attempt and the Aggies had more designed runs for him late in the season with 22 carries in the final two games.

North Carolina’s three losses featured a combined total of more than 200 rushing yards from quarterbacks as it will not be a surprise if Mond’s legs are a big part of the game plan for the Aggies in this game as well. North Carolina will also be missing former quarterback Chazz Surratt who converted himself into one of the ACC’s better linebackers as well as the defense could certainly be vulnerable to Mond’s mobility.

Betting Analysis – Texas A&M Aggies

Straight Up - SU, Against the Spread - ATS, Over-Under (O/U)

• 2020: 8-1 S/U, 5-4 ATS, 4-5 O/U

The Aggies wound up #5 in the rankings somewhat by default as the Pac-12 and Big XII did not play enough games to have produce another team in that mix while the SEC did not have the depth it usually has.

The shortened schedule worked against the viable teams outside of the power conferences as an undefeated Cincinnati or Coastal Carolina was not given fair consideration without the high-end wins that are required.

Having lost by 28 to Alabama might normally knock a team like the Aggies out of consideration but Florida’s performance in the SEC Championship provided a boost to the narrow elite win Texas A&M did produce over the Gators.

Beating LSU and Auburn usually would stand as impressive resume notes, but both of those teams had down years and the Aggies struggled in both of those contests, putting up only 20 points vs. a marginal LSU defense and trailing in the fourth quarter vs. Auburn.

Texas A&M also did not wind up playing Ole Miss who certainly could have provided a test to the Texas A&M defense.

The Aggies allowed just 21 points per game this season, but Florida and Alabama combined for 90 points vs. Texas A&M in its two highest rated games on the schedule. In its final four games the Texas A&M allowed a total of only 43 points, but 6-4 Auburn was the only winning team that Texas A&M faced after October.

The Aggies allowed only 3.3 yards per rush as the Tar Heels could struggle on the ground without their stars, but it is worth noting that opposing quarterbacks posted a slightly better QB Rating vs. Texas A&M than they did vs. North Carolina despite the gap in the scoring numbers and the perceptions of these defenses.

Jimbo Fisher and the Aggies had a great season but the defense looked suspect when facing quality offensive units. (AP)

Betting Analysis - North Carolina Tar Heels

• 2020: 8-3 S/U, 5-6 ATS, 6-5 O/U

North Carolina was considered a serious threat to be in the ACC Championship game at the onset of the season, in part as the revamped schedule did not feature Clemson.

The Tar Heels alternated wins and losses vs. the number in the first eight games of the season and the first two S/U losses came while playing as healthy road favorites. The Tar Heels also nearly lost hosting Wake Forest in November before a stunning comeback with 28 points in the fourth quarter.

The final numbers in the biggest test of the season hosting Notre Dame did not look great as they were outgained by 180 yards, but North Carolina led 17-14 early in that game and did not look out of place.

Destroying Miami 62-26 in the finale in this Orange Bowl stadium showed the potential of this group.

North Carolina’s defense had rather average results with some stretches of much worse than average play. Wake Forest put up 53 points and 606 yards against the Tar Heels in Chapel Hill while Florida State also had 31 points in the first half against the Tar Heels.

Several slow starts occurred for this team and they were not always good enough to come back out of it. Given the many opt outs it is hard to envision the enthusiasm for the Tar Heels being at the level it was for the Miami game, but this can still be a competitive team.

North Carolina is 4-3 ATS as an underdog under Brown and this will be the second biggest underdog spread for the Tar Heels in those two seasons, overshadowed by the +27.5 numbers vs. Clemson last September.

While the defense has surrendered some big figures to mediocre ACC teams at times, in the seven games where they have been dogged, North Carolina has not allowed more than 34 points as the defense has stepped up in those games.

Historically Speaking

These programs have never met in football, and these coaches have never faced off as opposing head coaches. Jimbo Fisher was the offensive coordinator for LSU in a 35-20 loss to Texas and Mack Brown in the 2003 Cotton Bowl.

The Orange Bowl has not featured conventional matchups in recent years as teams that currently reside in the Pac-12, Big XII, ACC, Big Ten, and SEC have all been Orange Bowl champions in the last 11 years.

The underdog has covered in 10 of the past 13 Orange Bowls and only three times in that span has the favorite spread been more than a touchdown.

The past two Orange Bowls have featured double-digit spreads with wins but missed covers for the favorites. The SEC is 0-3 ATS in the three recent trips to this game though Alabama and Florida hold the past two Orange Bowl titles.

The ACC has lost its past two Orange Bowl visits going 1-1 ATS but from 2012-2015 the conference went 4-0 S/U and ATS in this game with Fisher accounting for the 2012 win.

Notable Betting Trends

-- North Carolina is on a 9-6-1 ATS run as an underdog since 2018 though with only four S/U wins in those games.

-- Since 2007 North Carolina is 20-13-2 ATS when dogged by 7 or more points including covering in the past four instances.

-- Last season’s bowl win was the first for North Carolina since 2013 with the Tar Heels on a 3-7 S/U and 5-5 ATS run in bowls since 2004.

-- Texas A&M has improved its bowl record with back-to-back wins the past two years though with a missed cover last season.

-- The Aggies are just 8-15 S/U in bowl games since the 1991 season, going 10-13 ATS.

-- Texas A&M is on a 4-7 ATS run as a bowl favorite since 1986 including failing vs. the number in three of the past four instances.

-- Since 2015 Texas A&M is on a 14-8 ATS run as a favorite of fewer than 10 points overall.

Orange Bowl Predictions

• Score Prediction: Texas A&M 40, North Carolina 30
• Best Bet: Over

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