Kentucky Wildcats vs Louisville Cardinals Point Spread Picks

It's not just the Governor's Cup that is on the line for Kentucky in this in-state rivalry match-up against Louisville. The 5-6 Wildcats need to win here to become Bowl eligible. That's a big deal for Kentucky. The Wildcats had put a late stretch hot streak to get into this position, beating Tennessee Tech, 42-10, upsetting Florida at home in smashing fashion, 38-7, and upsetting Auburn, 10-3, as an 11-point road underdog. But Kentucky's win streak was halted by Vanderbilt, 45-17, on the road last week. Now the Wildcats go from playing one of the better teams in the SEC to a middle-of-the-road ACC team. In other words, a step down. The Cardinals are in a late-season rut, losers of three in a row. They've scored only 51 combined points in these three games, all losses: SMU (38-6), Clemson (20-19), and California (29-26 in overtime), as an 18.5-point home favorite. The Cardinals are the more banged-up team, too, hit hard at the skill positions. Their top three running backs - Isaac Brown, Keyjuan Brown, and Duke Watson - are out, along with their top wide receiver, Chris Bell, who leads Louisville with 917 receiving yards and six touchdown catches. In addition, quarterback Miller Moss is questionable. Take Kentucky. 

Kentucky is on a 1-5 SU/ATS slide. In their last three games against Top 25 opponents, the Wildcats lost 33-27, 51-13, and 49-21. Kentucky is 16-27 ATS in November games, plus 10-20 ATS off a road loss. Louisville has lost just one game this season and is 2-0 against Top 20 teams, winning 33-20 over No. 10 Notre Dame and 23-0 over No. 20 Duke. They're on a 10-2 spread run at home and have a defense that is 23rd in the country in points allowed (20.2 per game). Louisville is 27-13 ATS against winning teams and coach Jeff Brohm is 24-7 ATS versus opponents who average 4.75+ yards rushing per carry. Play Louisville.

Louisville has won five of its past six games with the only loss being against Clemson and the Cardinals come off a 25-10 victory over N.C. State on Saturday. Louisville used a balanced offense against the Wolfpack as Brock Domann threw for 153 yards and Jawhar Jordan ran for 105 yards on 16 carries and N.C. State was held to 77 yards rushing. Louisville is #37 in the country in total yards allowed and #20 in scoring defense allowing 19.6 points per game. Kentucky allows 19.6 points, but the Wildcats have lost five of their past seven games, including a 24-21 loss as a 17-point favorite against Vanderbilt and then losing 16-6 to top-ranked Georgia last week. Kentucky is averaging only 16.3 points its last seven games. Will Levis completed 20 of 31 for 206 yards against the Bulldogs, but with just one TD pass and an interception. This is a huge revenge game for Louisville, which was routed 52-21 in last year's meeting and the Cardinals have covered five of their last six games and they have gone UNDER four of their last five. Kentucky has stayed UNDER five straight following a loss and they are 11-1 UNDER their past 12 games overall. Take Louisville (Max Play), and play this game to stay UNDER.

Both teams come off blowout wins against terrible defenses, but playing each other will be a different story as Louisville allows 24.7 points per game compared to 22.2 for Kentucky. The Wildcats' wins this season have come against bad to mediocre teams, including 56-16 last week against New Mexico State, which is 1-10. Louisville destroyed Duke 62-22 while racking up 384 yards rushing on only 37 carries and QB Malik Cunningham accounted for most of the offense with 303 yards passing and 224 more on the ground in what is one of the best offensive games in history. Cunningham completed 18 of 25 with five touchdowns and no interceptions. Obviously, he's not expected to come near to duplicating those numbers against the Wildcats, but he is capable of a dominant performance. The Cardinals are 8-3 ATS their past 11 games as favorites, 5-0 UNDER as home favorites. Kentucky is 11-3 UNDER as a road underdog and 1-4-1 ATS its last six November games. Play Louisville ATS as my first pick on this game, and also take the UNDER as a Max Play.