Big 12 Championship: Arizona State vs. Iowa State Showdown

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00:00Big 12 championship game is the first off today of our Power 4 title matchups and like

00:09we are seeing across the board, a newcomer to the league will play for a conference crown

00:14on this Saturday.

00:16That's Arizona State.

00:17Kev, I mentioned how all the newcomers are at least slightly favored in their matchups

00:22today.

00:23Arizona State opened as a favorite against Iowa State, line got up to two and a half.

00:29There has been a ton of buyback on the Cyclones who just capped off their first ever 10-win

00:36season and they've been playing football and Aims since 1895.

00:41Iowa State in search of its first ever conference championship.

00:46Where we sit right here, on the morning of conference championship Saturday, this game

00:51at AT&T Stadium is a virtual pick-em.

00:54Arizona State, minus 111 now on the money line, just three cents of difference for the

00:59Cyclones at minus 108.

01:01Will it be that competitive with a Big 12 title at stake?

01:04Well, let's put this into further perspective because that's obviously one book there.

01:07How about another book?

01:08Minus 112 Iowa State, minus 108 on Arizona State.

01:11Another one going minus 115 to the Clones and the Sun Devils at minus 105.

01:15So it looks like this morning, batters have woke up and laid it down with Iowa State here

01:20in this game, which is something I agree with.

01:22And I looked at this game a number of different ways and how do I want to approach this?

01:26Where could I find value?

01:27But it just boiled down to me liking Iowa State a little bit more.

01:31And one of the things that I was, look, it could either be a pro or con, it's on the

01:38eye of the beholder, but Rocco Bacchus coming off of the worst game he's ever played, probably

01:43in his college career.

01:45I mean his passer rating, if you know anything about how the college scale is, under 100

01:49is about as bad as you could possibly get.

01:51He was an 88.9, he completed 37% of his passes against K-State, 13 of 35 in that matchup

02:00against the Wildcats, which again, K-State has been certainly of the projected good teams,

02:06the best of that bunch this year, so you know that that's a tough group to play.

02:10The fact that they won with that type of game out of Rocco Bacchus, I think Ben, one of

02:14your better quarterbacks in the Big 12 this season, helps things out quite a bit.

02:18You don't have a fully healthy Arizona State team walking into this game either, with Tyson,

02:22their star wide receiver, out for the foreseeable future.

02:26We don't know if it's an Aiden Hutchinson type, hey I'll be back for a championship

02:29game type thing, but he's out for the foreseeable futures there.

02:32I think that helps the Cyclones.

02:33And here's the other one, and it's not a slight, Kenny Dillingham, but I will take Matt Campbell

02:39in the game.

02:40I think Dillingham has been awesome for Arizona State, what he's done quickly at the program,

02:45I've seen the praises on this desk of Dion, you could probably sing them louder for Kenny

02:50Dillingham, because he doesn't have maybe the first and second NFL draft picks on his

02:53roster, right?

02:54Oh, he certainly doesn't have that on his roster this year, and he sits there 10-2 within

02:58the Big 12, so I like Dillingham a lot, but Matt Campbell I think is a little bit more

03:04battle tested.

03:05He's played in these games before, the PlayStation Bowl, the Fiesta Bowl I believe it was, I

03:08think it was the PlayStation Bowl against Oregon where he got that win, and he's been

03:12battling within the Big 12 with top teams for a very long time, he's just been doing

03:15it a lot longer than Dillingham.

03:17The Clones in search of that first conference championship, they did play in the Big 12

03:21title game in the 2020 season and did lose to Oklahoma.

03:25Rocco Beck has been inefficient at times, but he's put up a lot of yardage, and he's

03:30got a pair of wide receivers as good as you will find in this conference and in the sport,

03:35in both Jaden Higgins and Jalen Noel, 20 FBS players, Kev, have caught for more than 1,000

03:41receiving yards this year.

03:42These are the only pair of teammates to both go over that 1,000-yard marker, Higgins and

03:48Noel.

03:49Jordan Tyson, ASU's top target, also in that category of more than 1,000, in fact, one

03:55more yard, more than 1,100, he was injured in the regular season finale against Arizona

04:00in that second half of the Territorial Cup, he is out indefinitely as we share this week.

04:06But a moment for Kenny Dillingham, because we talked about the newcomers in their conference

04:10championship games in some spots, still all booked as a favorite.

04:15SMU unlikely, they were tied for the sixth best place to win the ACC before the year

04:20got underway.

04:21They were one of the few teams in this reshuffling of conference realignment that jumped up a

04:25level from a group of five conference to a power league.

04:30Arizona State moved from the Pac-12 to the Big 12, but the Sun Devils were picked dead

04:34last in the preseason media poll after a three-win season in Dillingham's first year as the

04:40head coach in Tempe.

04:42You see that price, Kev, plus $12,000 for ASU to win a Big 12 championship, second longest

04:50number in the conference entering the season.

04:52Arizona State is 10-2, and they have covered in every victory this season.

04:56So this is what I am battling with a little bit when it comes to the Big 12, whether it's

05:02fair or spot on.

05:04But clearly the issue that the Big 12 has had is their standings are flipped on the

05:10head.

05:11Like if I were to read these standings to you, Ben, right?

05:14Oklahoma State first, Arizona second, UCF third, Utah fourth, preseason, you go, no

05:19doubt.

05:20Yeah.

05:21Yeah.

05:22That's last, second, last, third, left, fourth.

05:23Like that, it doesn't make any sense.

05:24If I would have said, hey, the worst four teams, Arizona State, Iowa State, BYU, Colorado,

05:27you go, wow, bad year for Iowa State.

05:30But the rest of that all checks out.

05:33The flipping of, the nature of this conference being flipped on its head is why they are

05:38so far back within the rankings this year.

05:41It is why they are only getting in because of an outright bid, because Arizona State's

05:47the type of team, or Iowa State's the type of team, well, Arizona State more specifically,

05:51but it's the type of team that is only ranked because, you know, hey, we lasted long enough

05:56to kind of get here.

05:58Is that fair to the Big 12?

06:03Yeah.

06:04Yeah.

06:05Yeah.

06:06Yeah.

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