Week 8 college football DFS must-starts: Stacking Baylor stars

Looking ahead to the weekend in college football, here are the players you absolutely must start if playing daily fantasy football. Hint: Go heavy on Baylor.

It has become apparent that you cannot win if you do not cuff Baylor quarterback Seth Russell and wide receiver Corey Coleman together.

Against a pretty good West Virginia defense, they combined for 100.1 FanDuel points. That is far and away more than any two teammates have scored as a combination this year. The hard part this week is trying to find a lineup where you can play both those guys and still fit other players. History tends to repeat itself -- and the recent history of Russell-to-Coleman for six happens quite often.

If one thing has become clear with this week’s matchups, you are going to need to find the right quarterback. But who is the right one? Baylor's Seth Russell and Houston's Greg Ward Jr. are two of the best dual-threat guys in college football, but my favorite matchup of the weekend is Oklahoma’s Baker Mayfield at home against Texas Tech.

We should all be back on Baylor running back Shock Linwood this week. I held him off my top players list for the first time all season last week against West Virginia, but he has another prime matchup this week against Iowa State. The Cyclones have allowed more than 170 yards rushing four times this year, and 260-plus yards twice.

Must-Starts

Quarterbacks: Seth Russell, Baylor (vs. Iowa State); Greg Ward Jr., Houston (at UCF); Baker Mayfield, Oklahoma (vs. Texas Tech)

Running backs: Derrick Henry, Alabama (vs. Tennessee); Alex Collins, Arkansas (vs. Auburn); Shock Linwood, Baylor (vs. Iowa State)

Wide Receivers: Corey Coleman, Baylor (vs. Iowa State); Demarcus Ayers, Houston (at UCF); Gabe Marks, Washington State (at Arizona)

Tight End: Rodney Mills, Massachusetts (vs. Toledo); Jordan Leggett, Clemson (at Miami); Hunter Henry, Arkansas (vs. Auburn)

Iowa State at Baylor: If you listen closely you can still hear the sound of touchdowns raining down on West Virginia’s defense. Baylor is maintaining its record pace on offense and it is time the country just jumps on the bandwagon before it is too late.

Russell has decided he is also Cam Newton and ran for 160 yards last weekend. You add in his 380 passing yards and six overall touchdowns and that gives you a monstrous 57.2 FanDuel points. That is not something that should be expected every week, but now we know what Russell’s ceiling can be if he uses his legs effectively. Iowa State’s 461.8 yards allowed a game is good for No. 112 in the nation.

The usual suspects are back for this Baylor game as well. Coleman and wide receivers Jay Lee and KD Cannon should be mixed in your lineups. I stated earlier how much I like Linwood this weekend, but there is no way to get four of them in your lineup at once.

Texas Tech at Oklahoma: Team A’s defense has been playing some great football. Team B’s defense just allowed 475 yards to KANSAS! Team A just ran for 232 yards against a Kansas State team that was allowing 105 rushing yards per game. Team B allows 263.9 rushing yards PER GAME!

If you guessed that Team A was Oklahoma, then you are already aware that Mayfield is going to have another (May)field day against this defense. If you take away his one bad start on the season against Texas, Mayfield is averaging 35 FanDuel points per game. With a potent offensive counterpart in Texas Tech quarterback Patrick Mahomes, let us hope this game is a shootout.

I am still holding hope that Samaje Perine has a breakout game. The disappearing act Perine has performed this season would leave Houdini in awe. If he does not run for more than 150 yards with at least two touchdowns -- he ran for 213 yards and had three touchdowns in last season’s matchup -- then I think it is time we officially break up.

Washington State at Arizona: WSU quarterback Luke Falk has averaged 54 (!!!) passing attempts per game this year. If you are looking for the contrarian play at quarterback, he is your best bet. This team is loaded with talent at wide receiver and the Cougars are not known for running the ball. Falk has a prime matchup again this week. Arizona is coming off a game where they allowed 339 yards passing to Colorado. Mike Leach has done a tremendous job with this Wazzou team and the offense is clicking on all cylinders.

Wide receiver stacks can certainly pay off big time if you can make them work. Washington State is a prime example of a team where you can just plug and play guys and reap the rewards. Dom Williams and Gabe Marks are the two best receivers on the team. Marks has posted two 27 FanDuel point games this year and Williams just posted his best game of the year with 33.3 FanDuel points. If you are looking for the full stack, even River Cracraft has been extremely productive this year. His average of 11.8 FanDuel points per game is better than most teams' top guys.

A sneaky play from the Arizona side of things would be running back Jared Baker. He just ran for 207 yards against Colorado and Washington State ranks No. 110 in the nation in rushing yards allowed per game. The Wildcats' injury report has yet to be released so at this point starting back Nick Wilson is still a big question mark, but I would not be opposed to playing either running back in this game.

Under the radar finds: Phillip Ely, QB , Toledo (at Massachusetts); Kareem Hunt, RB, Toledo (at Massachusetts); LJ Scott, RB, Michigan State (vs. Indiana); Joe Mixon, RB, Oklahoma (vs. Texas Tech); Alex Erickson, WR, Wisconsin (at Illinois); De’Mornay Pierson-El, WR, Nebraska (vs. Northwestern); Josiah Price, TE, Michigan State (vs. Indiana)