College Football Week 4: Saturday NCAAF Parlay Picks - 3 Undervalued Underdogs at nearly +1400 odds!

College football Week 4 is underway with a South Alabama beat down of Appalachian State in Boone on Thursday night, which may be a sign of things to come this weekend. For many teams across the country, Week 4 marks the start of their conference schedules — which should lead to a bunch of highly-contested matchups and exciting outcomes.

Keeping the underdog theme that South Alabama started, I assembled a 3-leg Saturday NCAAF parlay that consists of my favorite underdogs to win outright in Week 4, and will provide a brief breakdown for each leg below. 

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Kansas Jayhawks ML (+105)

Arkansas Razorbacks ML (+115)

East Carolina Pirates ML (+240)

NCAAF Saturday Parlay odds: +1398

Odds courtesy of Fanatics Sportsbook at the time of publishing.

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Kansas Jayhawks ML vs West Virginia Mountaineers (+105)

Kansas and West Virginia have offenses that were highly-regarded coming into this season, and both have underwhelmed through 3 games. Not only do the Jayhawks and the Mountaineers rank outside the top 45 in offensive ppa (excluding garbage time), but both are also bottom 12 in giveaways per game and neither have produced scoring opportunities at the rate that was expected. The Mountaineers have played the tougher schedule, but they are 116th in defensive ppa and 125th in points scored per opportunity — yielding nearly 5 points per opposing trip inside their 40-yard line. Those defensive inefficiencies cost them the game last week in Pittsburgh, as the Mountaineers floundered a 10-point fourth-quarter lead and lost outright to the Panthers. Kansas has lost 2 straight, including a home loss to UNLV on Friday night last week.

However, my power ratings suggest the wrong team is favored in this matchup — likely due to West Virginia’s defensive woes. Despite Jalon Daniels and the Jayhawks taking a massive step back offensively with the loss of offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki, they still have a decent advantage over West Virginia in yards per play margin and have been much better than the Mountaineers at keeping opponents out of the endzone. In a game with so much potential variance through turnovers and explosive plays, give me the underdog with an extra day of rest on the money line. 

Arkansas Razorbacks ML vs Auburn Tigers (+110)

I broke this contest down in my Arkansas vs Auburn game preview and have already played Arkansas +3 — but I like the Razorbacks to win outright, as well. They have a top 10 rushing offense that averages more than 250 yards per game and maintains a top 25 explosive rate, running behind a stout offensive line that is top 15 in line yards. While the Tigers are solid defensively against the run, they haven’t seen a rushing attack as potent as Arkansas this season. Furthermore, Auburn will start a freshman quarterback in his first conference game against an Arkansas team that has continually performed well as road underdogs under Sam Pittman. 

East Carolina Pirates ML vs Liberty Flames (+230)

Jake Garcia and the Pirates have been extremely turnover prone, yet they are 2-1 SU heading into Week 4. They should be 3-0, but they let a 16-0 first-quarter lead over Appalachian State slip away by only scoring 3 points in the final 3 quarters. As such, investing in ECU may require some Tums, but I promise this is more of a fade of Liberty than it is a play on the Pirates. The Flames have the reputation of being one of the Group of 5’s best, but that is more because of their success in previous seasons rather than this year. Through 3 games, the Flames may be 3-0 SU — but they are 0-3 ATS against one of, if not the easiest schedule in all of FBS. In Week 1, Liberty yielded 24 points to FCS Campbell and didn’t pull away from the Fighting Camels until the fourth quarter. Liberty needed another big final quarter in Week 2 when it trailed New Mexico State 17-9 before a 21-point outburst in the final period, and last week the Flames were never close to covering against UTEP.

Now they have the Pirates coming to town, who are likely hungry to avenge their Week 3 loss and put an end to Liberty’s 15-game regular season winning streak. ECU is by far the best defensive opponent the Flames will have played to this point with top 35 marks in opposing ppa, total scoring opportunities and points per opportunity. The Pirates are also top 20 in havoc generated, which should put added pressure on Kaidon Salter — who has a fairly high turnover-worthy play rate compared to his interception rate. Representing a decent step up in class for Liberty’s offense, ECU’s defense may be the best unit in this matchup and the difference in ECU winning or losing. Give me the Pirates.