Every Penn State fan expects the team to beat West Virginia under the Beaver Stadium lights in Saturday night’s season opener.
It makes all the sense in the world.
Penn State went 11-2 last season, won the Rose Bowl and finished the year ranked No. 7 in the AP Poll.
West Virginia, on the other hand, went 5-7 in 2021, 6-7 in 2021 and, not counting the COVID year, hasn’t had a winning season since 2018, the season before Neal Brown became the head coach. It’s widley expected that a bad 2023 will get Brown fired, and more than a few WVU fans wish that had already happened.
Well, with game week to open the 2023 season finally here for WVU, sports bettors are officially giving the Mountaineers absolutely no chance to go into Beaver Stadium and upset Penn State on Saturday.
It’s been well documented how down most in the media are about this season’s West Virginia team. Add that to how high many are about the Nittany Lions and the fact tying to win at Penn State is already hard enough, and you get WVU opening the week as 20.5-point underdogs.
These odds are also not just from one particular sportsbook either. Bet MGM, Caesars, Draft Kings, Fan Duel and several others all have Penn State as a 20.5-point favorite. BetRivers is being a bit kinder and has the line at 19.5 in favor of the home team.
These odds are somewhat fitting because bettors suggest Brown will be the first head coach fired.
All West Virginia fans can do now is hope the Mountaineers can shock the world. The sales pitch from Brown has to be that upsets do happen, there’s a reason why the games are actually played and not just simulated by a computer and it is possible any team can be vulnerable in a week 1 scenario without film to watch with this roster in an actual game. Pat McAfee did pick WVU as his Big 12 dark horse, for whatever that’s worth.
Either way, the country will be watching as NBC will televise West Virginia and Penn State under the lights. Kickoff is set for 7:30 pm ET Saturday night.
