There’s nothing quite like being on the right side of a last-gasp, backdoor cover. Our beloved Temple Owls showed some serious spunk against Georgia Tech last weekend, punching in a touchdown with three ticks left on the clock to get us to the window, and moving this column’s record to 3-1 on the season. But we’re taking things to a whole new level this Saturday, and that can mean only one thing: Get your muskets ready, we’re backing UMass.
There was a time last year when I was convinced that UMass Football was on the rise.
The Minutemen finished the season with a 2-10 record, but three of those defeats came by five points or less. They also scored 21 points against Georgia!
In other words, you could look someone in the eye and say that UMass was just a couple of bounces away from a 5-7 season, which would have been an achievement worth celebrating. Like hitting safely in 56 straight MLB games, but more impressive.
But the football gods tend not to look kindly on UMass, so the bounces didn’t go their way. That meant another two-win season. And it meant the end of Don Brown’s second stint as head coach in Amherst.
It also stopped any momentum that the Minutemen were working on ahead of a huge 2025 campaign that saw them rejoin the illustrious ranks of the MAC. Look out, Akron. Heads up, Toledo. Watch your back, Bowling Green. UMass is back.
Unfortunately, the beginning of UMass’s second tenure in the MAC has not been rosy. The Minutemen got crushed by Temple in their opener, lost by one point to Bryant (an FCS school), and then got walloped by Iowa.
Impressively, UMass has yet to score a touchdown through the air, and new head coach Joe Harasymiak has been forced to use three different quarterbacks through the first three games of his reign.
Things are set to get even more dire this weekend, as Harasymiak and the Minutemen travel to beautiful Columbia, aka “The Athens of Missouri,” as 44.5-point underdogs against the undefeated Tigers.
The good news is that No. 20 Missouri is likely to take this one pretty lightly. Mizzou just scored a massive 29-20 win over South Carolina last weekend and is staring down a bye week after the visit from UMass. On the other side of that breather is a three-game stretch that will define their season: Alabama (H), Auburn (A), Vanderbilt (H).
With almost nothing to gain from their adorable little tussle with UMass, you can expect Mizzou to be more than happy to race out to a big lead and then give as many of their key players an elongated bye week by putting them on the sidelines.
More good news. Missouri loves to pound the rock. The Tigers rank 15th in the country in rush rate (61.8 percent), which should keep the clock moving and shorten the game, giving our Minutemen a real shot at keeping this game within 6.5 touchdowns.
This is the fourth season I’ve been writing this ‘Ugly Underdog’ column, and UMass has featured in this space more than any other program. I want to tell you that they’ve never let us down, but we’re all about honesty at The Post, so I can’t do that.
The Play: UMass +44.5 (-110, FanDuel)
Michael Leboff is a long-suffering Islanders fan, but a long-profiting sports bettor with 10 years of experience in the gambling industry. He loves using game theory to help punters win bracket pools, find long shots, and learn how to beat the market in mainstream and niche sports.