Schiano leaves Rutgers for Tampa Bay
Football Betting Lines
01/26/2012 - Newark, NJ (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Tampa Bay Buccaneers must have been serious about finding a new coach from the college ranks.
After a strong flirtation with Oregon's Chip Kelly last weekend, the Bucs on Thursday have reportedly settled on Rutgers' Greg Schiano.
Numerous reports earlier on Thursday indicated that Schiano was finalizing contract details with the Buccaneers, while the Newark Star-Ledger has cited a source as saying Rutgers now needs a new head coach.
Tampa Bay needed a replacement for Raheem Morris, who was fired earlier this month after the Buccaneers closed out a 4-12 season with a 10-game losing streak.
Schiano spent the past 11 seasons at Rutgers and posted a record of 68-67 at the New Jersey school. He turned around a Scarlet Knights program that had just one bowl appearance prior to his arrival into a perennial postseason contender.
Rutgers has been to bowl games in six of the past seven seasons, including a Pinstripe Bowl win over Iowa State in December that capped a 9-4 season. The Scarlet Knights have a record of 56-33 in the past seven years, with only one losing season in that span.
Schiano, who had been the longest-tenured head coach in the Big East, has minimal NFL experience. He was a defensive assistant with the Chicago Bears in 1996-97 and the club's defensive backfield coach in '98.
The 45-year-old New Jersey native was also an assistant at Penn State from 1991-95 and the defensive coordinator at Miami-Florida from 1999-2000 before taking over the moribund Rutgers program.
Things started slowly at Rutgers, as Schiano's first four teams won a combined 12 games. The 2005 squad went 7-5 and reached a bowl game, setting the stage for one of the program's best-ever seasons.
In 2006, led by future Baltimore Ravens star Ray Rice, the Scarlet Knights went 11-2 and captured the school's first-ever bowl victory with a 37-10 triumph over Kansas State in the Texas Bowl. Rutgers finished 12th in the national rankings that season and Schiano was honored with numerous coach of the year honors.
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Michael Vick is back, Brett Favre isn't and the NFC East remains the best division in the NFC, maybe in all of football.
As players start to gather for the start of another season, some things change and some stay the same in the world of the NFL.
The NFC East has been the dominant division in the National Conference for a while, despite limited playoff success, save for the New York Giants surprise Super Bowl win two seasons ago.
Hell, there's a generation of kids in Texas who have never seen the Cowboys win a playoff game (last win was in 1996).
But collectively, the Giants, Eagles, Cowboys and Redskins (well, maybe not so much the Redskins) are as good as a division gets in an NFC conference that has struggled to stay competitive with the AFC side.
Sports bettors have both acknowledged the NFC East's dominance, as one glance at the NFL future odds menu will show.
Looking over the NFL betting odds at online sports book MySportsbook.com we see the top three teams listed to win the NFC Championship are all from the NFC East:
Dallas Cowboys - 7 - 1
Philadelphia Eagles - 13 - 2
New York Giants - 9 - 2
Slotting in behind these three are two teams from the NFC North: the Minnesota Vikings (15-2) and the Chicago Bears (10-1).
Again, despite the lack of recent playoff success, the Dallas Cowboys are popular with the sports betting community, as they hold 14% of all the money wagered on who will win the NFC Championship.
So far, the New York Giants are the bettors' favorite to represent their conference in the Super Bowl, as they have 24% of the overall NFC Championship betting volume.
And what about the Philadelphia Eagles? For the most part, the Eagles had a very productive offseason, the kind that could bring them back to the top.
They had a good draft adding the likes of WR Jeremy Maclin and RB LeSean McCoy.
Unfortunately, the team received a blow when long-time defensive coordinator Jim Johnson passed away on Tuesday.
But this team will make a real run at the division title this year. Going into the regular season, Philly is listed at +240 to win the division.
Last season the Eagles were 9-6-1 SU and 10-6 ATS.
Teams from the NFC East will play teams from the AFC West in the regular season and the Eagles haven't really been a good bet in the last 20 games against the likes of San Diego, Oakland, K.C. and Denver, only going 8-12 ATS.
Two seasons removed from that Super Bowl title, the New York Giants see themselves listed as the odds-on favorite in NFC East championship futures at +162.
Plaxico Burress is gone and with him all the bad publicity surrounding the gun in the sweatpants incident, but can they replace him in the offense?
Last season the Giants were a very reliable bet going 12-4 ATS.
In the Giants' last 20 games against fellow teams from the NFC East; they are 13-7 ATS.
Dallas is listed at +240 to win the division.
Dallas went 9-7 SU and 7-9 ATS last season and with the amount of talent the Cowboys have, a similar performance won't do.
The Cowboys have been atrocious against divisional rivals, going 6-14 ATS in their last 20.
The Washington Redskins are longshots to win the division at +550.
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