Underestimate the American Athletic Conference at your own risk. If chalk holds, the AAC very well could see its conference champion reach the College Football Playoff.
Looking at broad college football odds, the Memphis Tigers should have about a 12% chance of reaching the first 12-team Playoff.
More likely, though, chalk will not hold. Memphis is good, but not great, and that usually yields some tumult in a Group of Five conference.
AAC predictions for 2024
- South Florida to win AAC (+1000)
- Temple Under 2.5 wins (-120)
- Army Under 6 wins (-120)
- Best Heisman bet: Seth Henigan (+100000)
Click on each pick to read full analysis.
Odds to win AAC
Memphis Tigers
Tulane Green Wave
UTSA Roadrunners
South Florida Bulls| Team |  |
|---|---|
 East Carolina Pirates |
+2,000 |
 Rice Owls |
+2,000 |
 North Texas Mean Green |
+2,500 |
 Army Black Knights |
+2,500 |
 Florida Atlantic Owls |
+3,000 |
 Navy Midshipmen |
+3,000 |
 UAB Blazers |
+3,000 |
 Tulsa Golden Hurricanes |
+4,000 |
 Charlotte 49ers |
+5,000 |
 Temple Owls |
_18,000 |
Odds as of 8-9.
Only the Pac-12 has fared worse in the recent realignment shifts than the American did. The AAC lost three of its best programs to the Big 12 a year ago and its 2023 champion to the ACC. It is restocked with five struggling programs from Conference USA, one strong program from CUSA and one formerly independent service academy pondering an existential crisis about the triple-option.
What the American gained in quantity (now at 14 teams, with seven joining since 2023), it distinctly lost in quality over the last two years.
That leaves only a handful of competent programs in the conference, with more than half of the AAC considered multiple possessions worse than the average FBS team.
The favorites
Memphis may be favored in 11 of its 12 regular season games this year, the certain exception coming in Week 3 at Florida State. But the Tigers also have to go on the road to face the three next-best teams in the conference: at South Florida, at UTSA, and at Tulane in the final game of the regular season.
Behind fourth-year starting quarterback Seth Henigan, Memphis should win each of those games. Even at UTSA to start November, the Tigers could be field-goal favorites.
But that sheer number of worrying conference matchups in a conference largely devoid of competent teams is enough of a scheduling disadvantage to dissuade any Memphis futures.
UTSA, Tulane, South Florida, and Rice can all claim to be competent or vaguely competent. Simply enough, read them in that order.
Both the Roadrunners and the Green Wave will be built on defense this year, both programs also resetting much of their expectations. UTSA has to navigate life without its greatest player of all time, quarterback Frank Harris, while Tulane has to move forward without head coach Wille Fritz and 2023 ACC Player of the Year Michael Pratt.
Both programs have high enough floors to warrant some consideration here — literally, the first note taken on UTSA this summer was, “high floor.” But the turnover and offensive worries of each cast doubts on their future value.
The rest of the field
Ignore the rest of the field. Only CUSA has a smaller competing class. Five of these 14 teams could conceivably win the American. The other nine will be happy to land a bowl appearance, something only 1-3 of them will manage.
Someone may try to talk you into East Carolina being much improved this season, but that is akin to saying Carolina is further south than Canada. The Pirates were a special brand of bad last season. Improving should be the bare minimum. So if someone insists to you that they can compete, ask them which Carolina the Pirates live in, and if they do not quickly have a definitive answer, realize they are simply eschewing a talking point they heard elsewhere.
Pick to win AAC
South Florida
Odds: +1,000 at Circa
Returning seven offensive starters headlined by Henigan and receivers Roc Taylor and Demeer Blankumsee has brought Memphis plenty of offseason praise. Other than the Tigers, though, no one in the AAC has received more hype this summer than South Florida.
Some of that ties to the Bulls supplementing 17 returning starters with the best recruiting class in the conference.
Some of it is a testament to head coach Alex Golesh finishing his first season with four wins in the final six games, including a 45-0 wallopping of Syracuse in the Boca Raton Bowl. Even if dismissing most bowl results in this era of quick roster turnover in December, that shutout was astounding.
Returning nearly 80% of its production furthers that enthusiasm.
But the biggest reason to take a flyer on the Bulls is the possible growth in Golesh’s second season. He runs an up-tempo offense that should only better with time. Sophomore quarterback Byrum Brown should be more mature and thus avoid some of his more than three dozen sacks from a year ago.
Five of South Florida’s eight AAC games are against the bottom half of the conference, and the bottom half of the AAC is so bad, assume the Bulls will win those. That high of a floor warrants risking a 10-to-1 future.
AAC best bets for 2024
Temple Under 2.5 wins
Odds: -120 at DraftKings
Let’s not overcomplicate this. Sure, it is a wildly low win total, one with significant juice at some sportsbooks.
But it is still too high.
The Owls went 3-9 each of the last two years and now return eight starters. Some might ponder if it is good to not bring back many players from those losing teams, but it is not like Temple is filling out the roster with top-tier transfers. The starters now are mostly the players who were not good enough to start on that 3-9 team last year.
So ranking No. 130 in returning production is a worrying sign. But let’s further emphasize the ugly plight of this coming season.
The Owls are not expected to be favored in a single game. They are nearly three points worse in some power rankings than Charlotte, the next worst team in the AAC. Unfortunately for Temple, it does not even face Biff Poggi’s team.
To clear this win total, the Owls will need to spring three upsets this season. More likely, head coach Stan Drayton will be fired by November and the final month of the year will be spent going through the motions.
Army Under 6 wins
Odds: -120 at DraftKings
This was not the right time to ponder going back to the triple option. Joining a conference, in fact, is the exact moment to fully leave the offensive scheme the NCAA has increasingly limited over the last two years.
The Black Knights decreased their rush frequency over usual expectations (when considering down, distance, score, etc.) to 27.2% in 2023 from 33.4% in 2022. They lined up in shotgun 80% of the time last season, compared to 10% of the time in 2022.
And none of that worked. Their offensive efficiency ranked No. 114 in the country in 2023.
So now, all signs indicate Army is reverting back to the triple-option. But Navy’s time in the AAC has shown, that offense struggles more in a conference. Opponents have more time to study up; they spend much of the offseason focusing on conference foes, readying for these tweaks.
For the Knights to clear this win total, they will need to win every game they are favored in, including the regular season finale against the Midshipmen. Army has won the last two of that matchup, meaning absolutely no one should expect it to stretch that to three.
Heisman Trophy insights
Seth Henigan, Memphis Tigers, QB
Odds: +100,000 at Circa Sports.
You read that correctly. Henigan is listed at 1,000-to-1 to win the Heisman Trophy. That might be worth a $5 bet.
He threw for 3,883 yards and 32 touchdowns last season, rushing for five more scores.
He returns his top two receivers and four of his top six. The schedule includes a chance at a shocking upset with a Sept. 14 trip to Florida State. The regular-season finale could be a conference championship play-in game, with stakes enough that even the AAC would garner notice.
Henigan could throw for 4,500 yards on a team fighting for the Playoff. That may not be the value bet when looking at AAC futures, but it could be something to ponder at these 1,000-to-1 odds.
More College Football conference predictions
AAC stat to know
If we were setting the full season’s lines today, the bottom four teams in the AAC — in order of worst to slightly less bad: Temple, Charlotte, Tulsa, and Florida Atlantic — would be favored against exactly one other FBS opponent, when the Owls host Florida International. That is how bad the bottom of the AAC is these days.
Not intended for use in MA.
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