Ohio State vs Texas Odds, Picks & +EV Week 2: No. 1 'Dogs
The No. 1-ranked Ohio State Buckeyes travel to Austin as 1.5-point ‘dogs against the No. 4 Texas Longhorns, with the total coming in at 49.5 points. Currently, the best place to play the Buckeyes on the moneyline is NoVig at +117, take Ohio State there, and you've got a 6.9% edge on the market compared to the +103 average. Meanwhile, Texas backers are getting the shortest juice at -120 at BetMGM. Both teams dismantled their lesser opponents in Week 1 by 50+ points.
Ohio State vs Texas Odds - Week 2
| Team | Moneyline | Spread | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ohio State Buckeyes | +117 (at NoVig) | +1.5 | O 49.5 |
| Texas Longhorns | -120 (at BetMGM) | -1.5 (-105 at Bally) | U 49.5 |
Odds as of Wednesday, September 9 at 1:30 PM ET
Ohio State vs Texas Analysis
A 1.5-point line between the No. 1 and No. 4 teams in the country tells us the market can’t separate these two. Notably, it’s the same number the books landed on for the 2025 opener, though OSU was the favorite then. That one went to the Buckeyes, 14-7, in Columbus with the UNDER 46.5 point total cashing with no sweat. In that outing, Arch Manning and Julian Sayin were in their debut as starters.
Let’s start with the latter. Since that first meeting with Texas, Julian Sayin has turned into a completely different quarterback. That night he went 13-of-20 for 126 yards with a 40-yard fourth-quarter touchdown to Carnell Tate and not much else. He finished the season with 3,610 yards, a 32:8 touchdown-to-interception ratio and a 77 percent completion rate, third-best in NCAA history, and a fourth-place Heisman finish.
He opened 2026 with a 21-of-25, 320-yard, three-touchdown afternoon plus a rushing score in a 56-3 handling of Ball State, a game in which the Buckeyes piled up 671 total yards. His passing touchdown total this week is set at 1.5 (-107 at Underdog) and, if my calculations are correct, 32 touchdowns across 2025 is better than two per game. Two passing touchdowns feels like a very reasonable bar for Sayin after what he did last season and what Ohio State showed in Week 1.
Texas is coming off a 59-7 win over Texas State, with Arch Manning going 20-of-27 for 305 yards, four touchdowns and an interception before being pulled in the third quarter. The bigger concern was the defense, which gave up 349 total yards to a Pac-12 team and needed three takeaways to help turn it into a blowout.
Manning also has more weapons this season, including Auburn transfer Cam Coleman, who had three catches for 70 yards and two touchdowns, and Ryan Wingo, who added seven catches for 121 yards and a score. The big question is whether Manning can put last year's Ohio State game behind him and he’s already said this week he has "not a lot of good memories from a year ago."
Ohio State lost seven defensive starters to the draft and still held Ball State to 165 total yards. Getting the No. 1 team in the country at plus money in a game the market considers a coin flip is the kind of spot you take, so I'll be locking in the Buckeyes moneyline at NoVig with +117 odds, the best +EV number on the board so far.
Ohio State vs Texas +EV Opportunities This Week
We're early in the week and the props are still thin, so the edges our optimizer is finding sit in the 50-52 percent range rather than anything eye catching. The best of them is Cam Coleman OVER 56.5 receiving yards at 51.6 percent and the edge here is pure line shopping: FanDuel, Caesars and Prop Builder are all posted at 59.5 on the same player, so DraftKings is giving you three free yards. Bo Jackson OVER 55.5 rushing yards grades at 51.4 percent, with FanDuel closest at 56.5 for -118 and both DraftKings and Dabble sitting up at 58.5 yards. Jackson ran for 1,000-plus yards as a freshman last season and carried it 12 times for 83 in the opener. Don’t feel rushed, though. There'll be far more options once the full prop menus drop later in the week.