Buffalo vs Ball St.

[Raji]

Buffalo Bulls vs. Ball State Cardinals

The line: It opened favoring Ball State by two touchdowns but has risen between a half point and point. The total of 62 has stayed steady.

What’s at stake: Unfortunately for Ball State, not as much as it would like. An unbeaten season is a goal, but a BCS bowl won’t happen with the Cards third in line behind Utah and Boise State among unbeaten non-BCS teams.

There was talk of an all-BSU bowl matching Boise State and Ball State in the Humanitarian Bowl, but the Cards didn’t want to play a bowl game in Boise State’s home stadium. Thus, Ball State seems headed to either the Motor City Bowl or GMAC Bowl. Buffalo appears targeted for the International Bowl.

How they got to Detroit’s Ford Field: The MAC West champion Cardinals had their first perfect regular season since 1965. The East champion Bulls won the school’s first-ever division title. It’s the first MAC title game for both. The Cardinals and Bulls will become the 10th different teams to play in the MAC title game in the past seven seasons.

Series history: Ball State has won all six meetings. Last year, the Cards led 28-0 at halftime on the way to a 49-14 victory (since that loss, Buffalo is 9-5 in the MAC). Ball State produced 507 yards of total offense to Buffalo's 219 yards. This will be the first neutral-site meeting.

Offense, offense, offense: Can Buffalo handle the best one-two punch in the MAC in QB Nate Davis and RB MiQuale Lewis? No teams have yet.

Davis was named the MAC Offensive Player of the Year this week. He has completed 67.3 percent of his passes for 3,095 yards with 25 touchdowns and six interceptions, good for sixth in the nation in passing efficiency. He also has run for 318 yards and four touchdowns on 49 carries.

Lewis is the MAC leader with 1,570 yards rushing to go along with 234 yards receiving and 20 touchdowns. He ranks fourth in the country in rushing and second in touchdowns and 100-yard games (10).

Buffalo is no slouch on offense behind RB James Starks and QB Drew Willy. Starks is sixth in the nation in rushing (122.6 ypg) and second in the MAC. He has 344 rushing yards fewer than Lewis but played in two fewer games due to injury. Starks has five runs of 50 yards or more this season.

Willy is fourth in the MAC in passing at 240.4 yards per game. In the past 18 games, he has 33 touchdown passes and just five interceptions. Receiver Naaman Roosevelt leads the MAC in receiving yards with 1,196 and 10 touchdown catches.

Ball State leads the MAC in total offense (455.8 yards per game) and scoring (37.7); Buffalo is seventh in total offense (387.2) and third in scoring (30.2).

A few numbers: While the teams seem to be even on offense, BSU has a big statistical edge on defense. The Cardinals finished first in fewest points allowed (16.7) and fourth in total defense (351.8 ypg) in the conference. Buffalo was seventh in points allowed (27.8) and 11th in total defense (400.4 ypg).

Ball State has won 11 of its 12 games this season by double-digit margins and has not trailed at the half. Buffalo has three wins in overtime and another by two points in regulation this season.

Don’t count on penalties costing BSU. It ranks first in the nation for fewest penalties (2.5) and fewest penalty yards (25.33) per game.

For comparison’s sake against the MAC’s two other best teams, Ball State beat Central Michigan by a touchdown and Western Michigan by 23 points. Both were in the season’s final two weeks. Buffalo missed a potential game-winning field goal on the final play against CMU and the following week coughed up a 14-point lead in the fourth quarter to WMU.

Raji