This is March! College basketball conference tournaments have wrapped up, which means it’s time to shift focus to the major betting event of the month: FanDuel Sportsbook releasing college football regular-season win totals.
Numbers for every power conference team (plus Notre Dame) dropped Friday, and you can bet on them now. In fact, I did.
Let's take a look at the recently released college football win totals and my NCAAF picks for the 2026 regular season.
Clemson Tigers Under 7.5 (-104)
Still piloted by Dabo Swinney, Clemson appears to still be getting some benefit of the doubt.
Swinney made a change at offensive coordinator, dismissing Garrett Riley and hiring an old assistant, Chad Morris, after a finish of 66th in Points Per Drive. But is Morris, who hasn’t conducted an offense since 2020, really the answer here?
Clemson benefits by playing eight conference games this year, but it draws LSU and South Carolina in the nonconference. This is a team that has lost at least four games in three straight years.
And since Brent Venables departed, the defense has been closer to good than great.
Christopher Vizzina takes over at quarterback and is an interesting prospect with some decent weapons out wide, like T.J. Moore and Bryant Wesco Jr. But the offensive and defensive lines are some of the weakest we’ve seen at Clemson in a long time.
I’m not calling for Clemson to go 3-9 — after all, it'll still likely be favored in at least seven games — but the bad start potential is there, just as it was in 2023 and 2025. There’s little wiggle room this year.
Kansas Jayhawks Under 5.5 (+122)
For the first time since the 2008 Les Miles team, Kansas will have a new starting quarterback. OK, not actually, but Jalon Daniels has been in place for the last six seasons, and now he’s not.
The 2023 season is looking more like an anomaly as the Jayhawks turned in back-to-back 5-7 seasons. And this year, the schedule difficulty cranks up with Missouri in the nonconference, a game against Arizona State in London and then road games at Utah, Kansas State and TCU.
The QB spot comes down to Isaiah Marshall, Cole Ballard and Rice transfer Chase Jenkins, all adept runners with some good playmaking ability but below-average arms.
Head coach Lance Leipold thrives on the ground, and he brings back Andy Kotelnicki to call the offense, which is good for anyone who lines up under center.
But this isn’t a team that got better or more experienced this offseason, and it’s one that plays a tougher slate. I don’t see a bowl game in store for KU.
Penn State Nittany Lions Under 9.5 (-134)
Let’s lay the land here because Penn State is priced like it’s more or less the same program from before. It’s not.
Matt Campbell, Penn State’s third or worse choice to take over as head coach, imports half of his Iowa State team to the Big Ten and hopes to acclimate to the league right off the bat with 10 wins.
It’s true the scheduling gods managed to show Campbell and the Nittany Lions favor — they avoid Ohio State, Indiana and Oregon — but Penn State will still be underdogs in at least three games (vs. USC, at Michigan, at Washington).
Surveying Campbell’s tenure in Ames, he won 11 games in 2024 and nine in 2020 but hasn’t crossed eight wins in 8-of-10 seasons. Between 2021-23, Iowa State went 18-20 with some absolutely outrageous losses, like to Colorado last year, Kansas in 2024 and Ohio in 2023.
He’s a perfectly suitable coach, but not the caliber needed in State College.
The roster simply isn’t a nine-win roster in the Big Ten. There are still dozens of holes, particularly on the lines, which become a major problem in games against Wisconsin and Minnesota.
Cushy schedule or not, 9.5 is too high an appraisal for a team that won’t be favored by more than a touchdown in five games.
Washington Huskies Under 7.5 (+110)
Demond Williams is a Husky, whether he likes it or not.
Aside from the locker room disaster that episode likely was, Washington suffered some serious losses this offseason to follow up on its 8-4 campaign last year.
First, let’s dig into that eight-win season.
Washington needed 21 fourth-quarter points to avoid a loss at Maryland, scored 28 in the fourth quarter to cover its tracks against Washington State and racked up 24 second-half points to break a 14-14 tie with Colorado State (which would later fire its coach).
Washington was pretty lucky to get away with an 8-4 record.
The biggest concern on offense is the loss of running back Jonah Coleman. He was a huge catalyst who moved the offensive engine and, when he was removed from games (see: vs. Wisconsin and Michigan), Williams couldn’t get things going himself.
This resulted in some horrific performances. And just for good measure, Denzel Boston is off to the NFL.
Washington draws USC, Iowa, Indiana and Oregon. Games against Penn State, Minnesota and at Nebraska are coin-flips.
It’s too muddy a schedule with too much noise surrounding the on-field leader of the team and too many losses to go anywhere but under here.
