“Against the spread” refers to betting on a team to perform better than the point spread set by the sportsbook. They must either win by a margin greater than the spread (for favorites) or lose by fewer points than the spread (for underdogs) for the bet to be successful.
Quote from NY Post Point spreads are supposed to be the great equalizer. History has shown that the eventual champions are often underestimated by the composite sum of market influences, even when they’re media-friendly, high-profile programs. Consistently clearing high expectations is a sign of greatness.
I’m the case of this post, they have 1 more win above the spread than random chance would suggest. Which is meaningless.
But, even if they were if they were 8-2 against the spread, rather than 6-2-2, we’d expect about 1.4 teams to hit that mark every year if every spread was 50/50 to hit. The sample sizes in football aren’t big enough to matter and patterns in over/unders or spreads are better explained by variance than anything sticky or predictive almost every time.