College Football Picks & Predictions: Conference Championships (2025)
College football betting expert Scott Bogman will provide his top picks and predictions for every week of college football action. Let’s get ready for this weekend’s games with Bogman’s best college football bets for the Conference Championships. Check out all of his top college football Conference Championships picks and predictions below.
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College Football Conference Championships Bets & Picks
(Odds and lines via BettingPros’ consensus betting information)
Let’s dive into our top college football picks and leans for the Conference Championships.
No. 24 North Texas vs. No. 20 Tulane
This game will be intense with a potential playoff spot on the line, and we are showing value to North Texas. The Mean Green offense has been crushing opponents, with the seventh-highest average margin of victory (+20) in the country this season. Quarterback Drew Mestemaker leads the nation in passing yards and yards per attempt, and he's fourth in passing touchdowns with 29. He has also thrown only four interceptions. True freshman Caleb Hawkins leads the North Texas ground game. He leads the country with 23 rushing touchdowns, is seventh in rushing yards and 25th in attempts.
Tulane isn't as efficient as North Texas, but their play-calling has been just as balanced, slightly favoring the pass (52.6%). Quarterback Jake Retzlaff is the leading passer and rusher for Tulane. He has 14 passing touchdowns with another 14 rushing scores this season. Interestingly, the one game North Texas lost was against South Florida, when Byrum Brown and the Bulls put up 63 points on five turnovers and five touchdowns from the duel-threat quarterback. North Texas has only played two other one-score games, but both involved duel-threat quarterbacks in Broc Lowry of Western Michigan and the option offense of Army with Dewayne Coleman.
Retzlaff will likely keep this close, but ultimately, Tulane’s defense has been just too poor in pass coverage to expect them to win, even at home. The Green Wave is 119th in pass defense and 80th in pass coverage grade. Ole Miss just outclassed Tulane, but the loss to UTSA showed the weakness of the pass defense. North Texas also has a major weakness in its run defense, ranking 129th in the country. However, they tackle well enough to limit explosive plays and score enough to force teams to throw at their top-10 passing defense.
This game will be decided in the trenches when North Texas has the ball. Tulane pass-rushers Harvey Dyson and Jordan Norman lead them with seven and six sacks, respectively. North Texas left tackle Braydon Nelson has only given up one sack, while right tackle Jimto Obidegwu has a clean sheet. The entire offensive line has only allowed six sacks this season. Rain with light wind usually helps offenses, so the over shows value, but North Texas is 10-2 against the spread (ATS), and we are expecting another cover here.
Pick: North Texas -2.5
College Football Leans for Conference Championships
Western Michigan vs. Miami (OH) - WMU -1.5 & Under 43.5 Points
We are showing value to Western Michigan and the under. These defenses have been the reason these teams are in this game. The last game scored went over the total, but Dequan Finn has left Miami (OH) since then. The Redhawks are 41st in scoring defense (21.9 points per game allowed), and Western Michigan is 16th (18.7 points per game allowed).
Miami (OH) first replaced Finn with Henry Hesson, who struggled in a loss to Toledo before Thomas Gotkowski replaced him two drives into the game against Buffalo and led them to a win. Gotkowski had his first start last week against Ball State, putting up 45 points on one of the worst defenses in the country. Gotkowski gets his second career start in a conference championship game against one of the strongest defenses in the country.
Western Michigan has not lost since October 25th to these Redhawks. They have not allowed more than 21 points in any of their last four wins and have put up over 350 yards of offense two weeks in a row. We'll lay the points and take the under.
No. 17 Virginia vs. Duke - Virginia -3.5
There isn't much value shown here, but because these teams played recently and Virginia dominated, this seems like a very safe lean. Duke has been all offense this season, ranking 19th in scoring (34.6 points per game) and 97th in scoring defense (29.4 points per game allowed). The one-dimensional nature of their offense (59.5% passing) cost them against Virginia on November 15th in a 34-17 loss. The Blue Devils held the ball for only 24:02, were held to 255 yards and allowed 540 yards, including 224 rushing yards to Virginia in that game.
Duke did put up 49 on a very good Wake Forest team last week, but short fields set up by four Wake Forest turnovers helped; they still only had 378 yards with 34:39 time of possession and allowed 468 yards to a very mediocre Wake Forest offense. Virginia's only losses were both by one score, and the recent one was because quarterback Chandler Morris left with a concussion. Virginia is way more balanced on offense and has the defense to embarrass Duke again.