NC State opens as three-point dog to Georgia Tech

Georgia Tech opened on Sunday night as just a three-point favorite over NC State, though it has already moved to GT -5 at some places, according to Vegas Insider. That's not surprising since GT -3 feels like an awfully conservative number, suggesting that these teams essentially would be even on a neutral field. (Edit: Just kidding! I had this backwards because I'm a big dummy. The line suggests Tech would be more like a six or seven point favorite on a neutral field.)

But while Tech's offense is already giving me nightmares, there's no question that this team has deep flaws. Vegas expects State to keep pace on the scoreboard mainly because the Yellow Jackets have been super duper bad defensively--the 6.41 yards per play they're allowing ranks 115th nationally. NC State's defense, for comparison, is allowing 5.45 yards per play.

So the Jackets should put the ol' September pep back in NC State's offense, and the Pack is due a strong performance on that side of the ball after the last four games. The defense did the offense a solid against Syracuse and now it's probably going to be critical that they return the favor.

Should the sputtering continue, there will be much disappointment. And NC State will lose by several scores.