Best College Football Prop Bets for Arizona vs. Kansas State

Reed Wallach | Sep 12, 2024

Aug 31, 2024; Tucson, Arizona, USA; Arizona Wildcats wide receiver Tetairoa McMillan (4) looks at scoreboard during third quarter at Arizona Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Aryanna Frank-Imagn Images / Aryanna Frank-Imagn Images

Arizona and Kansas State meet on Friday night in a game that won't count in the Big 12 standings due to a scheduling issue, but will surely alter the perception of the conference race before play gets underway.

Two potent offenses will meet in Manhattan, Kansas on Friday night with each team looking to notch a College Football Playoff worthy win. With star power on both offenses, I'm targeting the biggest names in the player prop market.

Keep reading to find out how I'm betting Avery Johnson, Noah Fifita and Tetairoa McMillan in this primetime showdown.

Best College Football Prop Bets for Arizona vs. Kansas State

Odds via DraftKings Sportsbook.

• Avery Johnson OVER 45.5 Rushing Yards
• Noah Fifita OVER 269.5 Passing Yards
• Tetairoa McMillan OVER 92.5 Receiving Yards

Avery Johnson OVER 45.5 Rushing Yards

Johnson is a run-first quarterback. The sophomore quarterback has made a combined 44 passes through two games and 28 have been less than 10 yards (including behind the line of scrimmage). While the team hasn’t used Johnson in designed run plays like it used him for almost exclusively in his freshman season, I believe that will change with a high leverage game against Arizona. 

Further, Arizona’s rush defense has looked far worse than its secondary thus far, which can lead to a ton more carries for the quarterback who ran it eight times for 40 yards last season. 

This is an important game with College Football Playoff expectations, I think we see the full K-State playbook and more rushes from Johnson. 

Noah Fifita OVER 269.5 Passing Yards

Kansas State’s defense has some issues, as I noted in our early week betting preview. 

Zona has Fifita and McMillan engineering an elite passing game that features little drop-off from last season and will get to feast on a K-State defense that allowed Tulane to average more than 10 yards pre-drop back and put up a 14% explosive play rate. Both numbers rank in the 93rd percentile in both metrics relative to games last season, per GameonPaper.

This Arizona team wants to throw the ball and I’m not sure Kansas State has the ability to slow this passing game down. If the team falls behind like the point spread indicates, Fifita will throw the ball more than 40 times in this one. 

Last season, albeit under a different offensive coordinator, Fifita went over this mark in six of nine games. The team kept it light, even resting key players, last week against Northern Arizona as he only passed for 173 yards. In Week 1, he cooked a New Mexico defense for 422 yards. 

The game script calls for passing, and this Arizona offense should find success. 

Tetairoa McMillan OVER 92.5 Receiving Yards

Well, if Fifita is going to throw, McMillan is going to catch. 

Arguably the best wide receiver in the country may not follow up his 300 yard outing against New Mexico, but the volume is simply too high for him not to flirt with the century mark. 

He only had four targets in the glorified scrimmage against Northern Arizona after a massive target share of 15 in Week 1. Last season, McMillan had 130 targets, an average of 10 per game. In a pass-happy script, I’m siding with the best player on the field to get to his quota. 

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Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.

Follow Reed on Twitter @ReedWallach and get all his college football bets on betstamp @rw33

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