Ranking and Predicting Saturday’s SEC games – Week 2
With Tennessee playing Oklahoma, LSU visited Clangaville (Mississippi State), South Carolina playing Kentucky and Georgia playing Vanderbilt (as the CBS games – probably so CBS can say they’ve shown Vanderbilt this season), it’s going to be an interesting-but-not-that-interesting Week 2 of the 2015 College Football Season.
So here’s how we rank ’em….
- LSU at Mississippi State
Starkville’s going to be ROCKING on Saturday. The cowbells will be clanging, the screaming will be loud, and LSU will take a deep breath. The Tigers haven’t played 2015, thanks to a lightning storm/downpour ensuring that we didn’t see Brandon Harris/Leonard Fournette/Malachi Dupre/Les Miles/ The LSU student section beat McNeese State on Saturday night. Coming to Starkville won’t be an easy task for the Tigers, especially if Dak Prescott’s on form. MSU fans will be praying that their team don’t play as badly as they did at Southern Miss. This will be fun.
PREDICTION: We’re going to take LSU – a 2 point favorite in some books – by three points in a great game.
2. Oklahoma at Tennessee
Neyland Stadium’s going to be rocking on Saturday, particularly with Oklahoma coming to town. A lot of Vols fans were smelling blood with a weak Oklahoma coming to Knoxville….until they saw their own defense give up 557 all-purpose yards against Bowling Green on Saturday. Oklahoma’s Samaje Perine had a relatively poor day out against Akron (33 yards and 1 TD on 11 carries), but OU threw the ball a lot. Tennessee’s Josh Dobbs is really, really good. We’re hoping Marquez North comes back. This game’s going to be fun.
PREDICTION: Oklahoma’s a one-point favorite in Neyland, and we’re going to take the Sooners by 7 in a classic.
3. Kentucky at South Carolina
Williams-Brice should be loud on the Gamecocks’ first home outing of the season, and it’ll be interesting to see how they improve after a pretty awful Week 1 win against UNC, when they could quite easily have lost by double-digits. Spurrier’s got a lot to do with his offense – and he probably would have rather his AD scheduled a joke for Week 2 (see 91% of SEC Week Match-Ups (here’s to you, Tennessee). Mind you, Kentucky’s seven-point home win against Louisiana-Lafayette wasn’t anything to scream “Go! Cats!” either. This is not one for the neutrals.
PREDICTION: South Carolina’s a 7.5 point favorite. We’ll take the Gamecocks with the 10-point victory.
Here’s how awful the Week 2 slate is…..Georgia’s visit to Vanderbilt’s the fourth-biggest game on the SEC schedule. Georgia showed what a three-headed hydra it can be at running back, and Grayson Lambert did OK against Louisana-Monroe without showing a huge amount. Vanderbilt lost against Western Kentucky and was really poor. We should expect RB Ralph Webb get the ball a lot. Although will he make much of a difference against this Georgia front?
PREDICTION: Georgia’s a 20-point favorite. We’ll take Georgia to win by 28. Our friends at Saturday Edge also have their opinion on whether they can beat the spread….
5. East Carolina at Florida
ECU are one of the more entertaining offensive teams in college football, which should make it interesting to see how overmatched they are against Vernon Hargreaves and a Florida defense bringing back 2 starters from suspension. Florida dropped more than 60 in Week 1, and we can expect a lot of points dropped by the Gators this week too.
PREDICTION: Florida’s a 20-point favorite. Florida to win by 42.
6. Toledo at Arkansas
This will be interesting only for the betting fans/ESPN fans, with Arkansas 21-point favorite. Brandon Allen threw for 300 yards against UTEP, and Toledo’s going to struggle in its first game of the season. Watch out for Alex Collins to have a 100-yard, multiple touchdown game too. Watch to see if the Razorbacks can stop Toledo RB Kareem Hunt, who went under-the-radar last season despite a 1,600-yard season.
PREDICTION: Arkansas by 28. And that’s because they lift their feet off the gas mid-4th quarter.
7. Fresno State at Ole Miss
Can Ole Miss score 75? Probably not. Fresno State’s better than that. Can Robert Nkemdiche run for his second TD of the season? We hope so. Will this tell us anything about Ole Miss? Nope. If you play college football fantasy, putting in Laquon Treadwell for this game would be a pretty good idea.
PREDICTION: Ole Miss is a 30-point favorite, which is generous. Ole Miss to cover, winning by 41.
8. Ball State at Texas A&M
In years past – and the ‘D’ getting co-ordinated by Mark Snyder, it would be interesting to see if Texas A&M had improved week-to-week against Ball State. But in 2015 – with John Chavis in charge – Texas A&M’s ‘D’ was fantastic against Arizona State, and no, we don’t think Ball State’s offensive line will be able to stop Myles Garrett and Daylon Mack. And the defense – which gave up 36 to VMI in Week 1 in the 48-36 shoot-out win – is going to struggle against A&M’s receivers – like Christian Kirk, too.
PREDICTION: Texas A&M’s a 30-point favorite. We think they win by 35.
9. Middle Tennessee State at Alabama
The two good thing for MTSU fans looking at this Alabama game is that the Crimson Tide’s a 35 point favorite (they should look to take the Crimson Tide to cover), and their school is getting paid a lot of dough to come and get slaughtered. Alabama looked very impressive against Wisconsin on Saturday. This won’t be close.
PREDICTION: Alabama, led by Derrick Henry, wins by 42, covering the spread.
10. Missouri at Arkansas State
Maty Mauk took a horrible hit on Saturday, but was able to recover to have a 181-yard, 2 TD, 1 INT day. Drew Lock, his back-up, went 6-10 for 138 yards and a TD. Missouri is deep at QB, people. Arkansas State played USC pretty close at times, but then got blown out by the Trojans.
PREDICTION: Missouri’s an 11-point favourite on the road. They win by 21.
11. Jacksonville State at Auburn
Jeremy Johnson could have thrown five interceptions against Louisville. He was that bad last Saturday. Still, he’s a pretty good runner. He won’t need either against Jacksonville State.
PREDICTION: Auburn by 58. And Vegas isn’t even offering odds, they are so uninterested.