College Football Friday Night Picks: Three Games, September 18, 2026

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Three college games on Friday night and a side on every one of them. Houston at Texas Tech gets a full write-up. Miami at Wake Forest is a real handicap with almost no edge, and Portland State at Oregon is a formality.

Same arithmetic as the Saturday card. Take the two SP+ ratings as they stood after Week 2, hand the home team two and a half points, and compare that projection against what the board is posting. Where a team has no rating, the pick is the priced favourite. No totals and no player props.

The Friday Card

The Picks

• Miami at Wake Forest, 7:30 PM ET. Our numbers make it Miami by 19.7, within a point and a half of this line, so Wake Forest is only the marginally correct side. Take Wake Forest +20.5 at .
• Houston at Texas Tech, 8:00 PM ET, FOX. Our numbers make it Texas Tech by ten, but the line has fallen six points since last Thursday and the market is usually right when it moves that hard, so this is a small lean. Take Texas Tech -7.5 at . Read the full breakdown →
• Portland State at Oregon, 10:30 PM ET. Portland State has no rating to project, so Oregon is the pick as the priced favourite, a formality rather than a handicap. Take Oregon -56.5 at .

Bottom Line

Three Friday picks. Texas Tech is the only one with an argument behind it, and even that is a small lean. The other two exist so every Friday card on the board carries a side. The full Saturday card follows tomorrow morning.

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