BetMGM College Football National Championship Insights

John David Yonke

One more win. Just one more win and the Georgia Bulldogs will be the first school to repeat as National Champions since the Alabama Crimson Tide did so in 2011 and 2012.

Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, however, as Sonny Dykes’s TCU Horned Frogs look to conclude a magical season with a championship. Let’s look at BetMGM Sportsbook’s betting market insights heading into the big game.

Line movement (Open, Current) @ BetMGM

Georgia +200 to -450
TCU +15000 to +350

Think back to when Dykes was first hired. TCU finished the 2021 season with a losing mark (5-7), its second losing record in three years and third since 2016. While the program has been near the top of the sport in recent memory under Gary Patterson, things got to a point at the end of his tenure that it was easy to forget the heights that this program is capable of.

The National Championship betting market didn’t believe in the Horned Frogs to start the season, as they’ve gone from tremendous +15000 odds at open to +350 at current. The opposite can be said of Georgia, who began the year with the shortest odds in the country at +200 and moved to -450 in advance of the season’s final game.

Ticket and Handle (full season)

Georgia: 10% of tickets, 16.2% of handle
TCU: 12% of tickets, 9.62% of handle

Georgia has received plenty of love in the National Championship betting market over the course of the 2022 season, garnering 10.0% of tickets and 16.2% of the handle. While those tickets were placed at different times this season, many bettors should be in line to cash a plus-money futures ticket if the Bulldogs come away victorious in the National Championship.

TCU has been a bit more popular with the public, receiving 12.0% of the tickets (more than Georgia) but just 9.2% of the handle (nearly half of Georgia). It appears as though the larger wagers are on Georgia futures.

Ticket and Handle (since Semifinals)

Georgia: 12.2% of tickets, 11.6% of handle
TCU: 87.8% of tickets, 88.4% of handle

Since the semifinals concluded, Georgia is receiving just 12.2% of tickets and 11.6% of the handle. The Bulldogs are established as massive -450 favorites in the National Championship.

Bettors appear more inclined to take the juicy +350 number on TCU as the outright winner than laying the juice with the favorite. It’s unclear if the market was impressed with the Horned Frogs’ 51-45 victory over the Michigan Wolverines in the Fiesta Bowl or preferred the favorable odds.