College Football DFS Picks: DraftKings CFB Week 12 DFS Plays

CFB DFS: DraftKings College Football DFS Week 12 Main Slate

We only get a few more bites left at the apple as we hit the final three weeks of the regular season. We have to savor these big main slates, especially when they're as good as this one. Let's take a look at what's on the board and where we can hunt for value and core plays.

Slate Overview

Tight Spreads & High Totals

Finding a game with a high over/under where both teams are expected to be competitive is always a primary goal for building our lineups. Games like that create a great scoring environment on both sides with little worry about the star players being pulled, like we do when a game gets lopsided. 

Here are this week's games to target:

Duke (-4.0) vs Virginia (O/U 58.5)

Duke gets the top billing yet again as the premier game to target on this slate. After last week's wild 37-34 loss at Connecticut, we get another banger with two ACC Championship Game hopefuls squaring off in Durham.

Leading off on the Virginia side, all eyes will be on quarterback Chandler Morris' ($8,200) status after he was knocked out of last week's upset loss with a concussion. The offense sputtered in his absence, mustering just nine total points and just 4.8 yards per pass attempt. The run game remained solid behind J'Mari Taylor's 98 yards to go with 30 yards receiving. Taylor checks in at $7,700. You'd feel alright about playing him provided Morris is available, but Duke is not budging much on the ground against conference foes, allowing 3.94 YPC. 

If Morris is in, the passing game becomes really appealing. Duke is a "pass funnel" defense that stops the run but hemorrhages yards through the air. The Blue Devils give up 8.7 YPA on the year. Their 285 passing yards allowed per game against conference opponents ranks 130th in FBS and 2nd worst behind only NC State among ACC teams. Virginia plays with good tempo and should be able to push for 35+ pass attempts here. 

Virginia's top-billed receiver, Jahmal Edrine, is just $4,600. Trell Harris is $4,200.  Starting tight end Sage Ennis might be worth a dart throw at $3,300 as well.

Duke's skill position players are much more juiced. Running back Nate Sheppard is 4th among RBs at $8,000 after churning out 26.5 points in Storrs last week. Cooper Barkate ($7,100) is a target monster who has a strong catch rate and is efficient with his opportunities (10.9 YPT in last 3 Games). Que'Sean Brown ($4,900) and Andrel Anthony ($3,700) offer good ways to get cheap exposure to this passing game.

Cincinnati (-6.0) vs Arizona (O/U 55.5)

This is a frustrating but important game to solve for this slate. Cincinnati has a terrible run defense, but Arizona has one of the more confusing backfield rotations in the Power Four. Brendan Sorsby has been one of the more bankable quarterbacks in the game this year, but Arizona has a sneaky-good pass defense. Still, the total is 55.5, and both teams are expected to chip in a healthy amount towards that total.

Cincinnati's offense flows through Brendan Sorsby ($8,800), who is a true dual-threat. 20 passing touchdowns with an 8.7 YPA. 453 rushing yards and eight scores on the ground. Now he gets a home matchup against an Arizona defense that has struggled to hem in mobile quarterbacks, allowing 412 rush yards and eight scores to QBs. It may be a tough day through the air for him, but that could steer him towards a productive day on the ground. 

Arizona deploys a balanced attack with about a 50-50 run-pass split and a low tempo (67 plays/game). Cincinnati is solid against the pass and rather weak against the run. The problem is that Arizona's running back rotation is confounding. 

So we've got Ismail Mahdi as the "top back" but the rushing percentages of late have waned. QB Noah Fifita runs a decent bit but isn't overly effective. Kendrick Reescano is the power back with three red zone touchdowns. All of this to say that I've got my eye on Quincy Craig as a tournament play at $4,100. He's coming off an impressive game against Kansas with two touchdowns and 60 total yards on five opportunities. Craig might be working his way into the rotation more and more down the stretch.

LSU (-5.5) vs Arkansas (O/U 56.5)

I can't, in good conscience, say this is a great game to load up on. Vegas knows more than I do and has set the total and the spread in a way that suggests a high-scoring game on both sides. I know Arkansas' defense is terrible. But is it bad enough to make LSU's offense look good? 

You can't trust Garrett Nussmeier right now. The run game is non-existent. Maybe that makes LSU an interesting tournament stack, but I'm not banking on that coming through. 

(You can yell at me if it does.)

Quarterback

CJ Carr, Notre Dame ($7,200) at Pittsburgh

Carr is priced down $900 from last week and $1,100 from Week 10. In fairness, he had softer matchups in those outings and didn't light it up in either for our purposes, putting up 21.2 and 20.7 DK Points. 

Additionally, both of those opponents (Boston College, Navy) are much softer against the run than Pitt, so Notre Dame was justified in flexing its muscles with its running backs. Pitt presents a different challenge on that front. It ranks 3rd in the nation against the run, allowing 80.89 yards per game and 2.39 yards per carry. Not to say Jeremiyah Love and Jadarian Price get shut down, but beating Pitt through the air is the path of least resistance.

Scaling things to Notre Dame's breakout game against Arkansas in Week 5, Carr is completing 68.2 percent of his passes at a 10.2 YPA with a 14:2 TD:INT in his last six games. He's not going to give you a ton as a runner, but this could be one of his more prolific passing days against one of the softer secondaries on the slate. The $7,200 price tag makes a 24-point outing from Carr more than enough, and he's easy to stack given that his top target (Jordan Faison) is just $4,800 and everyone else is $4K or less. 

Ty Simpson, Alabama ($8,700) vs Oklahoma

Oklahoma has a vaunted defense. SP+ has the Sooners rated as the No.3 defense. They stop the run and they get after the quarterback, ranking Top 5 in both categories. That's a great recipe. 

All that being said, I'm not sure it matters here. Alabama doesn't care about running the ball to begin with and Oklahoma has been gettable through the air in conference play, allowing 252.8 pass yards per game. 

Honestly, this is eerily similar to what Notre Dame is going up against with Pitt, though Alabama is the best team of this grouping and will be at home. Now, we can't discount OU's pass rush here as Alabama has been average in terms of sacks allowed. That said, we might see a lot of quick game and easy, short completions from Simpson to slow it down a bit since the Tide probably won't test OU on the ground much. Eventually, there will be time for Simpson to strike downfield, and we have reason to believe he can connect on those deep shots. 

I can't see Simpson carrying a massive roster % considering OU's defensive reputation. This might be a good spot to leverage the Tide passing offense against the field. 

Carson Beck, Miami ($7,700) vs North Carolina State

Well, well, well. Look what we have here. Beck and Miami have taken their lumps over the last two months with a pair of losses that have the 'Canes on the outside looking in for a playoff bid. Beck had six combined picks in those losses and looked much like the guy we saw in Athens in spots last year. 

The past is the past, though. And the present is a gift in the form of an extremely leaky NC State secondary.  NC State is giving up 297.7 passing yards per game to ACC opponents. The 300-yard bonus for Beck is very much in play here, despite not reaching that mark yet in ACC play. 

Miami has the second-highest implied total on the board (35.0) and Beck should have plenty to do with the 'Canes reaching that. 

Malachi Toney ($6,900) is a must-play if you're using Beck, in my opinion.

Others to Consider

Taylen Green, Arkansas ($9,000): The price tag and the road matchup against an (overrated) LSU defense might steer Green's roster percentage down. I think Green ends up being worth the $9K, and you can probably get away with only using him from the Arkansas offense. LSU has given up 361 rushing yards to opposing quarterbacks this season.

Running Back

There are too many good running backs this week to go fully in-depth on each of them, but here are my favorite plays at the position this week.

J'Koby Williams, Texas Tech ($5,000) vs UCF

There's no wrong week to target the TTU offense, though some are better than others. A home game against UCF qualifies. Cameron Dickey ($8,100) paces the backfield with a 40% carry share that has churned out 867 yards and 11 touchdowns. Williams gets a solid amount of work, too, though. At 26% of the carries, Williams has taken 105 rushes for 602 yards and five touchdowns while adding 23 catches for 332 yards and two scores on 28 targets.

His role and skill set make him a great play in this format, and he may push for more carries than usual if this is the blowout Vegas expects it to be (TTU -23.5).

Jordan Marshall, Michigan ($7,100) at Northwestern

Marshall is the bright spot for fantasy from an otherwise gross game, with the total sitting at 41.5. Justice Haynes is out for the year, which means the backfield belongs to Marshall. In the other two games sans Haynes, Marshall has accounted for 63 and 68 percent of Michigan's carries. Put another way, he's had 25 carries in each of his two starts. And 100 yards in each of his last three games overall.

Volume. Volume. Volume. 

Rueben Owens

Owens' case is like Marshall's in that he gets a bump due to an injured teammate. Though Owens doesn't look like the same type of workhorse as Marshall, this is a good setup here. He has seen at least 30 percent of the carries in two of his last three games and is coming off a 102-yard, two-touchdown game against Missouri. 

South Carolina gives up 172 rushing yards per game to SEC opponents. 

Desmond Reid, Pitt ($5,800) vs Notre Dame

It's hard to find a running back with a skill set better suited to DK scoring than Reid when he's full-go. He was a monster last season who has battled through bumps and bruises this year. Luckily, Reid has had two full weeks to get healthy for this clash.

Now, there's some risk here as Reid's replacement, Ja'Kyrian Turner ($4,800) went off in his stead against Stanford and should probably have some semblance of a role. My thinking here is that Reid may not be able to get a ton of traction on the ground, but his ability as a weapon in the passing game could be a big factor.

Reid caught eight of nine targets for 155 and 2 against Florida State in their upset win last month and Pitt may need to go back to that bag of tricks here. And if Pitt's in a catch-up script, that just means more target potential for Reid. 

Nicholas Singleton, Penn State ($4,800) at Michigan State

Another post-hype player with some intrigue this matchup, Singleton is back on my radar after being far, far off of it for much of the year. Last week was the first time all year he looked like the player we expected, taking 10 carries for 71 yards and two scores while adding three catches for 21 and another score. 

Doing that against Indiana is impressive, and it'll feel like taking off the batting donut this week when he faces a Michigan State defense that coughs up 184 rushing yards per game to Big Ten opponents. You don't want to be overweight on Singleton if you're doing multiple entries, but he's an interesting dart throw in this spot.

Others to Consider

• Harlem Berry, LSU ($5,100)
• J'Mari Taylor, Virginia ($7,700)
• Quincy Craig, Arizona ($4,100)

Wide Receivers

Here's this week's target cheat sheet. I filtered it to receivers on this slate with at least a 20% team target share who also average at least 8.8 yards per target. I also narrowed the sample to Week 8 through Week 11 to get a healthy sample while also giving weight to players who are clicking right now. Those are fairly arbitrary thresholds, but they still tend to paint a good picture of who is A.) Getting Volume and B.) Maximizing It.

KC Concepcion, Texas A&M ($6,200) vs South Carolina

Keep an eye on this one because if Mario Craver (undisclosed) is unable to go, this goes from a good play to a must-play. Concepcion already has a strong 24.4 percent target share over the last month and also gets some work on end-arounds. Craver being removed from the equation would push Concepcion into potentially seeing 10+ targets against South Carolina. The Gamecocks have grade well against the pass, but Concepcion is close to matchup proof and him getting real volume here could be an impactful development on this slate at large.

Raylen Sharpe, Arkansas ($3,900) at LSU

O'Mega Blake gets a lot of the attention from this group of Arkansas pass-catchers, and rightly so. Sharpe is starting to find his footing, though. He's gone for double-digit DK points in three of his last four games and owns a 20.0 target share with 10.5 YPT. 

LSU has a good secondary on paper but this season has gone pretty far off the rails, so it would not be stunning for Taylen Green and Co. to put up some points here. Sharpe is a nice pivot away from Blake if you still want exposure to the Arkansas offense Saturday.

Malik McClain, Arizona State ($4,400) vs West Virginia

There are a couple of interesting factors at play here. Sam Leavitt is out and Jeff Sims ($7,400) is in, which isn't great for the overall passing game projection. However, Jordyn Tyson being out as well really opens up the opportunities for McClain. 

McClain has seen 10 and 4 targets in the last two games while Tyson has been sidelined, and he's corralled nine of those looks for 208 yards. West Virginia's secondary looked shaky against first-time starter Julian Lewis at home last week, so while we know what Sims is at this point, we can still feel alright about the Sun Devil passing game having success here.

Chamon Metayer ($5,200) and Jalen Moss ($3,100) are other ASU pass-catchers to consider. 

Others to Consider

• Malachi Toney, Miami ($6,900)
• Lotzeir Brooks ($4,000) and Germie Bernard ($5,800), Alabama
• Malachi Fields, Notre Dame ($3,700)
• Isaiah Sategna, Oklahoma ($6,600)
• Barion Brown, LSU ($5,300)

*note that this article was written in the midst of a searing toothache. I stand by these plays, however.