Can Tennessee revive a little of its season? SEC Football Predictions
Right, it’s going to be a quick bunch of predictions this week, because if you’re a (or an, for grammar’s sake!):
FLORIDA fan and your team can’t beat JACKSONVILLE STATE at home
GEORGIA fan and your team can’t beat the triple-optioning, cut-blocking, GEORGIA SOUTHERN at home
TEXAS A&M fan and your team, with Johnny Football, Ryan The Receiver and KevinGod, can’t beat SAM HOUSTON STATE at home
ALABAMA fan and your team’s got Nick ‘Not As Imperious As We First Thought’ Saban as your coach, can’t beat WESTERN CAROLINA at home
SOUTH CAROLINA fan and you’ve got Jadeveon Clown-Man Clowney on your team, can’t beat WOFFORD at home
AUBURN fan and, despite all that’s gone wrong to your team – which are about 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 things this year – and you can’t beat ALABAMA A&M at home
KENTUCKY fan, and even though you’re already gotten rid of your coach, you can’t beat SAMFORD at home….
You should fire your coach. Unless you’re Kentucky. When you should fire just about everybody else, and then fire the next coach for just THINKING about coming to your school (Sorry Bobby, you’ve got no chance with Ashley Judd)….
BOTTOM LINE: All the SEC teams should win comfortably. Yes, even Auburn and Kentucky.
But otherwise….
TENNESSEE AT VANDERBILT
Before the season Tennessee losing to Vanderbilt would have been a joke for the program – and the rest of the SEC. Right now, with Vanderbilt bowl eligible again and Tennessee already beyond the brink of uproar (We can still hear the ‘Dooley out’ screams ringing in our ears), the joke’s on Tennessee. And it’s not a funny one. Heck, Vegas are giving the Vols four points before their trip into Nashville. Listen, Vanderbilt’s OK, but they aren’t exactly the biggest cheese in the SEC by any imagination (BTW, anyone else think James Franklin might end up somewhere else after the season ends?), but don’t ignore Tennessee’s offensive weapons. Cordarelle Patterson and Justin Hunter can be lethal receivers, and Tyler Bray’s still not the worst QB in the SEC (step up, Kiehl Frazier!). His decision-making at time just SUCKS. Tennessee is going to have to come out throwing bullets because they are only two games away from being bowl eligible (and they had chances to win against Georgia, Tennessee and South Carolina this season). Anyone smell the ‘upset’?
BOTTOM LINE: Tennessee wins. Just. Won’t be enough to save Coach Dooley, though.
OLE MISS AT LSU
LSU fans don’t like Ole Miss very much. “The Grove is like a cocktail party where snobby Mississippians go to a cocktail party that they don’t even invite you to. They think they are better than you,” said one resentful LSU fan (what happened to him in Oxford last season, folks?!). Good job the game’s at LSU, eh? And while LSU took the loss to Alabama in their stride and beat Mississippi State comfortably, Ole Miss once again broke their fans’ hearts by losing in the last minute to Vanderbilt at home in the Chandelier Bowl. With the amount of talent that LSU has got on the field in one of their final home games (and with LSU having a chance of getting in the SEC Championship Game if Alabama loses to Auburn (QUICK ADVANCE PREDICTION: WON’T BE HAPPENING!!!), Ole Miss fans should be happy if they get to fill themselves with gumbo before the game starts…and the Rebs are competitive in the fourth quarter.
BOTTOM LINE: LSU by three touchdowns. Sorry, Ole Miss.
ARKANSAS AT MISSISSIPPI STATE
At the start of the season, a lot of us thought that Arkansas would want to win this game to be BCS-competitive. Now, everyone sees only one winner: King Cowbell. Tyler Russell and his merry band of Bellers could have closed the game to within a touchdown at LSU if he hadn’t thrown a 100-yard pick six in the closing minute or two, and Mississippi State showed that they can still cause turnovers. Which will be good for Cow-Town Belles, because they love to ring when Dan Mullen’s boys do their thing (ED: Enough of the Cowbell stuff now!!). Tyler Wilson and Knile Davis now need to prove that they are NFL-worthy after a rough season, and to win a competitive one for one of the nicest guys in the business. It’s been a rough season.
BOTTOM LINE: Ring, ring, ding-a-ling. Mississippi State by 10.
SYRACUSE AT MISSOURI
Strange to say this, but both teams come away having caused an upset last week. Syracuse demolished previously-unbeaten Louisville, while Mizzou beat Tennessee in Neyland Stadium in four overtimes. Dorial Green-Beckham caught two touchdowns. This week, Missouri has the chance to get bowl eligible (and start a winning streak….of two!) in Columbia on Saturday. Can they do it against a suddenly revitalized Orange team?
BOTTOM LINE: Can they kick it? Yes they can! Missouri gets bowl eligible, by winning by 7 in a better game than most people think it would be.