If you’re trying to figure out who is going to win between the Texas Tech Red Raiders and the Oregon Ducks, you might want to go ahead and find a quarter and flip it a few times. Because right now, it really seems like either the Red Raiders or the Ducks could come away with this one.
Both teams are in the top 10 nationally when it comes to both scoring offense and scoring defense. Both teams have an abundance of talent all over the field. Both teams have had to navigate some tricky injury issues. And right now, both teams have a dozen wins.
If you checked in with the number crunching computers responsible for ESPN Analytics and the ESPN Football Power Index to try to figure out who was going to win the Orange Bowl, you’d find that it looks like the Red Raiders are currently favored (but it’s really not by much of a margin).
Texas Tech is being given just a 51.6 percent chance of beating Oregon in the quarterfinal round of the College Football Playoff.
ESPN Analytics Matchup Predictor gives Texas Tech a 51.6 percent chance of beating the Oregon Ducks in the Orange Bowl
And yeah, truly, you might as well be flipping a coin on this one.
Oregon is getting a 48.4 percent chance of beating the Red Raiders. Texas Tech has a slight advantage here according to the matchup predictor. But it’s not exactly enough of a difference to make me feel great about it all!
And we’ve got to talk a little bit about how there was a clearly dominant push from the Ducks in their opening round matchup with the James Madison Dukes to make it known that Oregon isn’t just going to play around here. The Ducks are looking to win it all this season. Texas Tech can’t show up to the Orange Bowl and play rusty.
It’ll be fascinating to see how this game plays out. Before checking in with ESPN’s matchup predictor, I kind of assumed that it could go either way based. Now, I’m certainly convinced about that. I don’t gamble in general, but this definitely isn’t the sort of game I’d be willing to put any money on.