Alabama or Clemson? Selection from Las Vegas

Las Vegas a fun place to watch championship games. Intense crowds.

LAS VEGAS -- There’s no question Alabama is the higher rated team in Monday’s national title game against Clemson, but is that rating gap really worth 6.5 points? According to Las Vegas oddsmaker Kenny White, the gap between the two teams is about half that number.

“Alabama’s played the better schedule in the SEC,” said White, “and Alabama’s the better team with the far better defense, but with the recent big wins by Clemson the disparity between the two closed to the point where, Alabama is rated only 3-points better (5-points better prior to ACC Championship). At the beginning of the season, the differential was 9-points.”

The added inflation to the number is sort of a luxury tax because sports books know the majority of the action will come on Alabama. Most books opened Alabama -7 just to see if they’d get some feelers taking the points, and some sharps did, which caused many to move to -7 (EVEN) or -6.5. William Hill’s 104 sports books across Nevada have taken 71 percent of the tickets written on Alabama, as well as 61 percent of the overall cash taken in.

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