Louisville Cardinals vs. Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets Pick ATS

Louisville Cardinals (0-0 SU, 0-0 ATS) vs. Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets (0-0 SU, 0-0 ATS)
College Football Week 1
Date and Time: Friday, September 1, 2023 at 7:30PM EDT
Where: Mercedes-Benz Stadium, Atlanta, Georgia
TV: ESPN

Point Spread: LOU -7.5/GT +7.5 (Bovada)
Over/Under Total: 51

The Louisville Cardinals come into Atlanta to battle the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets in an ACC Conference battle in which each team will begin their 2023 college football season. Louisville moves on from head coach Scott Satterfield, who took the head coaching gig at Cincinnati, hiring Jeff Brohm, who is coming off a 6-year run at Purdue and also had a 6-year stint as a positions coach with the Cardinals. They were 8-5 last season and won a bowl game. Georgia Tech, while just 5-7 last season, surpassed expectations in a way, following three seasons with three wins in each of them. Brent Key returns for his second season and first full season, looking to keep the upward trajectory moving. Neither of these teams were lucky enough to be one of the ACC teams being afforded easy week one opposition, getting a tough conference game to open the season. Who can get the job done in game one?

Setting the Table for Week One

Louisville looks to be dangerous this year. Jeff Brohm said he wants to win in year one. But they’re not getting served up an easy one. Granted, this isn’t a home game for the Yellow Jackets in the big stadium. But after interim coach Key took control, we saw a Yellow Jackets squad getting an awful lot out of what they had and scoring a handful of nice wins. Last season, the name of the game for Louisville was defense, allowing under 20 points a game, but the majority of impactful talent left, as did some key offensive players. Maybe that’s not as critical with a new head coach, but that “D” looks to take a step back. Brohm gets a QB in Jack Plummer, who follows Brohm over from Purdue after a pit stop at Cal in ’22 and should be a steady hand.

Many people might have an initial lean toward Louisville, even with the spread as of press time a tick over a TD. They have more talent, are coming off a better season, and their projection this season is significantly better, getting some help from what looks to be a fairly easy schedule. Still, under Key, we saw a Yellow Jackets squad playing with a wide range. For a good team with a lot of hope, perhaps that’s not a good thing. But in the role of underdog, it can be. There are going to be weeks when their talent deficit is too much to overcome. But against teams in Louisville’s classification, we saw them play really hard for Key, score some upsets, and hang in there better than expected in a decent handful of spots. Will we see this in week one?

What to Expect

The prospects of Brohm reuniting with a QB he likes bodes well to create some offensive firepower differential in this game. The Yellow Jackets lose QB Jeff Sims to Nebraska but also bring in some new blood with former Texas A&M quarterback Haynes King. We’ll see how he fits in, but there are less questions on the other side of the equation. Plummer can play. Brohm’s specialty is working with offenses and QBs in particular, and we should see Plummer maybe make a small step forward this season. And while they did lose a lot of the talent on a defense that was really solid last year with a big playmaking component, some of that is due to carry over as well.

I see Louisville putting up a fair number of points in this one. Being vaguely gutty on defense might not be enough to get in under the spread, as Georgia Tech will need to do some damage. We’re assuming it’s going to be King behind center, but that can change. Whoever it is will be stepping into an offense with a lot of new faces, as the Yellow Jackets have seen their top running back and their four top receivers from last season depart. They lost key guys along both lines, with their secondary also taking a hit. And while there was some optimism to be had with the transfer portal, a lot of their better transfers are guys who sort of washed out at better programs. While they could thrive in a somewhat-reduced context at Georgia Tech, it’s not going to terrify anyone, at least not on paper.

But Not So Fast…

Again, once Key was the man in charge roaming the Georgia State sidelines, they were tough in this role. Time and again, there were cases to be made against Georgia Tech that were clear and made perfect sense, and then you put on the game, and that analysis was down the drain in quick order. Whether it was beating Pitt by five as 21.5-point dogs or beating North Carolina by four as 22-point dogs, they really embodied the underdog spirit, going 4-2 under Key as an underdog. And that wasn’t just against the spread; that was straight-up. So sure, their offense seems to be in some flux. Their defense might be a little out of their wheelhouse against this Cardinals attack under Brohm. But getting results that surpass their apparent talent is something that could surface.

Lay the Number on the Cardinals

Something about this pairing makes me want to defer to superior talent rather than wishful thinking that the Yellow Jackets can be gutsy and recapture some of their underdog appeal from 2022. In fact, with so many questions to answer on both sides of the ball, Georgia Tech could very well be up against it this season, and that’s something we might see sooner than later. I see the Louisville passing attack getting the job done against what could be a beleaguered GT secondary. Perhaps it’s too optimistic to picture the Louisville offense hitting the ground running in week one, but they just seem the more dependable early-season option. I’ll take the Cardinals.

Loot’s Pick to Cover the Point Spread:

I’m betting on the Louisville Cardinals minus 7.5 points.