Holiday Bowl Against the Spread Prediction: Syracuse vs. Washington State

Syracuse Orange (9-3 SU, 6-6 ATS) vs. Washington State Cougars (8-4 SU, 6-6 ATS)
Holiday Bowl
Date/Time: Friday, December 27, 2024 at 8PM EST
Where: Snapdragon Stadium, San Diego, California
TV: Fox

The Syracuse Orange meet the Washington State Cougars at Snapdragon Stadium on the 27th in the Holiday Bowl. This bowl-game is a San Diego institution, a contest with an uncanny knack of providing good competitive games. Fans hope for similar this season with two teams who had their moments this year. These squads both last played on November 30, leaving an almost month-long break leading into this game. Syracuse enters this with some decent momentum, ending their regular season run with three straight wins, including a 42-38 win over Miami on the 30th. Washington State, meanwhile, fizzled out at the end, losing three in a row to end the season after starting 8-1. On the 30th, their slide continued with a 15-14 loss to Wyoming. What’s the right play for the Holiday Bowl?

Player Movement

Washington State has played on this field this season and with a nice degree of success, even if they didn’t cover, coming from off the pace to mount a big fourth-quarter comeback against San Diego State here in late-October. Unfortunately for the Cougars, other than an easy win over Utah State the next week, that was about it for them in terms of success and for the purposes of this game—good news. We see leading up to this game that not only will Washington State be dealing with some of the injuries that zapped them of their edge in late-season, but that a lot more bad news has come down the pike.

It’s just such a fall from grace for a Cougars’ group that overcame being a team without a conference and started the season 8-1. And even if you suspected they weren’t that good or were due to come down to earth, what they are now was hard to envision. Head coach Jake Dickert has taken the Wake Forest gig. The coordinators are gone. Starting QB John Mateer and at least ten starters are in the transfer portal and to truly cover all the different departures would be too cumbersome. Suffice to say it’s a mess. And when countered by a relatively-intact Orange team that finished the season in good form, it creates a gloomy outlook for the Cougars in this spot.

The Remaining Quality of Both Teams

Coach Dickert had really done a heck of a job with this group, making a lot of what he had at his disposal. And while things puttered out at the end, it was enough to get him what appears to be a slightly-upgraded gig. It’s just that the reversal of momentum and therefore overall morale is so stark, one struggles to be optimistic. They played here before. Maybe you don’t trust the Syracuse defense or are even dubious about an Orange squad that is going to be playing on this shabby Snapdragon field well out of their wheelhouse. But to sink at the finish line of the regular season, losing to the sub-.500 trio of New Mexico, Oregon State and Wyoming is bad enough. To see your coach leave and the bulk of your best talent takes it to another level completely.

For Syracuse, I’d look for coach Fran Brown to have this team pointed in the right direction to punctuate his first season with a bowl win. And sure, normally, that defense, which didn’t seem to get better over the course of the season, would be a drawback, but how bad can it be in a spot like this? But you still have QB Kyle McCord and his 4326 yards and 32 touchdowns, a good RB in LeQuint Allen, and a three-pack of receivers that are the envy of most teams in Oronde Gadsden, Trebor Pena, and Jackson Meeks. With 61 catches, Allen also chips in to the robust aerial attack. And while this is a daunting road-task, certain conference realignment quirks have made it so Syracuse has had to expand their range of travel. Not long ago, they were in this very state, beating Cal and not long before that, scored a very nice win over a good UNLV team in Vegas. So, this isn’t really so far out of their realm.

What to Expect

Even with Washington State’s bad end to the season, this game was perceived to be a showdown between two powerful offenses facing two questionable defensive units. Three parts of that equation are still in place, with the WSU offensive outlook thrown for a loop and their defense in even worse shape now than before. The Cougars are going to have to hang onto their hats on defense and hope for the best, but to see them hanging in a shootout with undetermined talent and coaching leading the charge isn’t easy. It’s unfortunate that Washington State got hit with just about every hardship a team could be hit with this season. They held up to it remarkably well, but not even they can survive the biggest oversight in all of sports, which is the scheduling of things that makes it so teams are torn apart right when it is supposed to be their biggest moments of their season.

Lay the Points

I’m not sure this is a total slam-dunk. The number is pretty big and seems to be growing as the game approaches. This field can mess teams up, and the Syracuse defense is bad enough to make it a possibility you tune into this and see something counter to what we’re being sold. I can’t see it. I think the Cougars are in such a tattered state now that a team like Syracuse is wholly out of their league. I don’t see the Orange going that easy, either. I see them getting a quick jump on the Cougars, keeping them at arm’s length, and getting the win and cover in the Holiday Bowl. I’m taking Syracuse.

Loot’s Prediction to Cover the Point Spread:

I’m betting on the Syracuse Orange minus 15 points.

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