Movelor Picks: Week 6, 2023

Our Movelor Week 6 picks are live and can be found in a more sortable format than this one here. If you’re curious what Movelor is, this is its homepage, but the short version is that it’s our college football model’s rating system, used across all Division I teams. Last year, it was roughly 0.9 points less accurate on FBS games than the Las Vegas closing spread. So far this year, it’s running roughly half a point behind each of ESPN’s FPI and SP+, with a median error a tenth of a point better than that of SP+.

Picks are below, but first, a few observations:

We’re down to 22 undefeated FBS teams, with 17 of those 22 in action this weekend. There are three undefeated matchups—Ohio State vs. Maryland, Oklahoma vs. Texas, Georgia vs. Kentucky—so we’ll exit Week 6 with a maximum of 19 undefeated teams, but Movelor’s expected number of losses among the eleven undefeated teams playing a non-undefeated opponent is 3.8, meaning we expect to finish the weekend with roughly 15 undefeated teams, the 22 cut down by nearly a third. Here are Movelor’s lines on the three undefeated matchups, plus the four with an undefeated underdog. We’ve marked the undefeated teams with an asterisk.

• Ohio State* –17.5 vs. Maryland*
• Oklahoma* –0.8 vs. Texas*
• Georgia* –16.8 vs. Kentucky*
• Missouri* +4.9 vs. LSU
• Louisville* +5.4 vs. Notre Dame
• Washington State* +4.9 at UCLA
• Marshall* +6.6 at NC State

Our model currently gives ten teams better than a 1-in-5 chance of making the playoff field. Of those ten, three are idle and two—Oklahoma and Texas—play one another. From the other five, Movelor expects 0.7 losses, meaning there’s a little better than a 50/50 chance of a playoff-shaking upset. We’ve got Ohio State and Georgia’s lines above, but here are the other three:

• Florida State –26.0 vs. Virginia Tech
• Michigan –15.7 at Minnesota
• Alabama –11.2 at Texas A&M

Other big games, at the Power Five, Group of Five, and FCS levels:

• North Carolina –5.6 vs. Syracuse
• Oregon State –15.7 at California
• Fresno State –12.5 at Wyoming
• Louisiana –7.5 vs. Texas State
• Southern Illinois –0.8 at Youngstown State
• North Dakota State –11.7 at Missouri State
• South Dakota State –22.6 at Illinois State
• UC Davis –5.5 vs. Montana
• Weber State –15.4 vs. Northern Arizona
• Incarnate Word –26.9 vs. Southeastern Louisiana
• Central Arkansas –5.9 vs. Southeast Missouri State
• Elon –12.8 vs. North Carolina Central
• Chattanooga –2.3 vs. Western Carolina
• Florida A&M –1.5 at Southern
• Harvard –16.3 vs. Cornell
• Yale –0.7 at Dartmouth
• St. Thomas –5.3 vs. Butler