No. 24 Northwestern gets Rutgers on Saturday afternoon in a Big Ten matchup that brings together two teams that have been putting points on the board.
The Wildcats enter at 5-1 overall and 4-0 at home, with their lone loss coming by six points as +20.5 underdogs at Indiana. Since then, Northwestern has answered with a 34-13 win over Penn State and then followed that up by handling Ball State and Michigan State.
Rutgers, meanwhile, has been uneven this season but arrives with some momentum after knocking off Maryland on the road last week.
A lot of the attention here goes straight to Aidan Chiles, who is in his first year at Northwestern. The senior quarterback began his college career at Oregon State and spent the previous two seasons as Michigan State’s starter.
Chiles threw for 1,392 yards and 10 touchdowns in nine games last year with the Spartans, and he has already gone past that production with 1,398 passing yards through six games this season. He’s completing 70.5% of his throws and has not thrown an interception, while adding nine passing touchdowns.
He’s also been a weapon on the ground. Chiles has already scored seven rushing touchdowns this season, one more than the six he posted in eight games last year.
At home, Northwestern should be able to lean on him again.
The number is high, but the best lean is still the OVER. Both offenses have shown enough to get there.
Rutgers has reached at least 21 points in five of its six games and put up 37 at Maryland last week. The Scarlet Knights also scored 15 points as large home underdogs against Indiana.
Northwestern was limited to 24 points last week at Michigan State, but the home form is what stands out. Before that, the Wildcats posted 45 against Ball State and 34 against Penn State.
Rutgers has gone over the total in five of six games, and Northwestern has done it in four of six. That makes the OVER the side I’d stick with here.
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Rutgers Just Got A Needed Boost Before A Brutal Road Test
A sorely needed bit of stability arrived for Rutgers on Saturday with Dantae Chin back at left tackle, giving the Scarlet Knights a steadier edge up front after the offensive line had spent much of the season trying to settle itself. Chins presence matters even more with Northwestern next on the schedule, because the Wildcats bring a defense that can squeeze games and a rushing attack that tends to make every snap feel heavier than it should.
Rutgers also got some encouraging production elsewhere in the win over Maryland, with freshman wide receiver Dyzier Carter turning in a career-high six catches for 88 yards. And on a night when the defense had to keep answering, linebacker Sean Allison helped preserve the margin with a key coverage play late in the fourth quarter, the kind of stop that can loom large when the margin for error gets thin before a road trip like this one. [Read more 🡒]
Rutgers Fans Just Got More Context For The Michigan TV Spotlight
Week 6s college football TV and attendance numbers gave a wider view of how the sport was drawing eyeballs and butts in seats, and the Big Ten had its share of the spotlight. The biggest audiences came from the league and the SEC, while games involving schools like Indiana, Michigan and Oregon also stood out on the attendance side, reinforcing how much attention still follows the conferences marquee matchups.
For Rutgers fans, the broader look matters because it puts the weeks Maryland game in some context. The crowd figure in that matchup may have looked like the low point in the Big Ten, but the data suggests the picture was a little murkier than it first appeared, with other games around the country producing similarly thin turnouts and some attendance reports not exactly lining up cleanly. [Read more 🡒]