San Jose St Spartans 2024 College Football Preview
Posted June 14, 2024
2023 Recap
Record – 7-6
ATS – 8-5
Things didn’t go as planned off the start as the Spartans dropped five of their first six games to fall behind the proverbial EIGHT BALL. San Jose St proceeded to go on a legit HEEEETER after that tough start and emerged victorious in each of their final six (!) games. The Spartans finished the regular season in a three-way tie for first place in the Mountain West, but then the “computers” went to work, and made sure that “surprisingly”, Boise St and UNLV ended up playing in the title game **. They finished the season with a disappointing loss to Coastal Carolina in the Hawaii Bowl (L 24-14) and ended things with a mark of 7-6.
** Rampant cheating, printing loads of fake ballots with Boise St and UNLV on all 500,000 of them, throwing San Jose St fans and alumni in jail, letting anyone on the planet vote for the conference champ without checking ID. Oh, wait. We’re getting confused with the tactics used in US elections. Never mind.
San Jose St Spartans 2024 Outlook
OFFENSE
The Spartans were an efficient and effective offense LY (#31 rush, #47 passing efficiency) but there are major personnel departures that have us losing sleep. Losing veteran QB Chevan Cordeiro (20-4 TD to INT, 272 rush LY) is a killer, RB Kairee Robinson was one of the most underrated players in the nation at his position (1,194, 18 TD, 7.0), and they only return one starter on the offensive line. The QB position is a BLACK HOLE with one of Washington St transfer Emmett Brown (4 career attempts) or something called a Walter Eget (9 career attempts) slated for the starting QB role. The RB unit looks very weak on paper and the Spartans have to hope that true freshman Lamar Radcliffe is a major SURPRISE PACKAGE. The only good news on offense relates to the return of QB turned WR Nick Nash who’s a devastating weapon in the THROW GAME (48, 728, 8 TD LY). If reports are to be believed we’ll see a lot more passing this year but we’re not sure the weaponry on hand is ready for that strategy.
DEFENSE
San Jose St was decent vs the pass LY (#42 pass efficiency D) but they really struggled defending the run (#99) and allowed the most YPG (170) since the 2019 campaign when they yielded 232 YPG. We’re talking before the PLANDEMIC, yo. Sadly, we need to go back into NEGATIVE NANCY mode as only four starters and one of the top-six tacklers return for battle, so things don’t look great heading into 2024. There are major losses to report including LB Bryun Parham who led the team in tackles LY and DL Tre Smith (6.5 sacks LY). The DL is in good shape as they boast decent size for a Mountain West squad and they bring back NG Soane Toia who’s a notable disrupter (5 sacks LY). The LB unit lost some key weaponry but at least they can count on Jordan Pollard (#2 tackler). We’ve got a bad feeling about a secondary that loses the vast majority of its talent and we expect them to get abused by the better passing teams on the schedule. It would help if they could come up with more than 24 sacks (#82 LY) but we don’t see much hope for improved PENETRATION this year.
SPECIAL TEAMS
It could be worse. San Jose St needs to find a new punter but they retain PK Kyler Halvorsen who was decent LY, but he wasn’t asked to do much from 40+ yards (1-2). Also recall that PR Matthew Coleman brought one back to the HIZZY CRIBBY vs Cal Poly LY.
Schedule Analysis
Overall – Let’s start with the good news. They have seven home games and a solid chance to start 3-2. Oh ya, they also finish with three home games. Unfortunately, they draw both Boise St (H) and Fresno St (A) in conference play, and It’s gonna be hard to find wins in the second half of the season.
Potential ATS Trouble Spot – Nothing heinous is noted.
Season Win Total
Market consensus June 14
Over 4.5 -115
Under 4.5 -105
MEGALOCKS says:
Lean: Under
That’s a sharp number. We’d feel a lot better about ‘under 5’ but still think the current price is reasonable.
NOTE – “Lean” implies this is how we’d invest in this market if forced to make a choice. We’ll notify subscribers in our Season Win Total blog post of any season win totals that have made our investment card.
MEGAmazing Tidbit
New HC Ken Niumatalolo is one of our favorite head coaches, and although things slid near the end of his tenure at Navy, it’s worth noting that he booked the most wins in program history. Fun fact: Coach K is the first ethnic Samoan collegiate head coach at any level.
MEGALOCKS Forecast:
The Spartans were a fun team to follow over the last four or five seasons but there appear to be rough seas ahead. They’ve got an inexperienced team that lost a lot of key talent and we’re particularly worried about the QB situation and the secondary. We don’t believe they’ll make it to a bowl game but hope that they prove us wrong. Best of luck, Spartans!