Today the SEC gets featured on ESPN’s Thursday Night Football spectacular. The Fighting Chickens host the #4 in the land old Rebel boys from Oxford. This week I am going to use the Glantz-Culver Line (as of Thursday, September 24, 2009 in the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer).
4 Mississippi vs. South Carolina
Ole Miss opened as 4.5 point favorites to take down the Gamecocks, but the line has withdrawn a little, now sitting at 3.5 points.
I am not impressed with South Carolina. They squeaked by North Carolina State 7-3. Even if this was a road win, a win over a mid tier ACC team is really not worth that much consideration. The next week the Gamecocks stumbled against Georgia, 41-37. That is a lot of points to give up; defense was supposed to be the team’s strong point. Last week offered up an unspectacular 38-16 over Florida Atlantic.
Mississippi is even far less impressive. Sure, they may be a top 5 ranked team, but what have they done to earn this ranking? They beat the Tigers from Memphis 45-14, which was a nice win I guess, but a game they were expected to win. Then they took a week off to rest before taking on the powerhouse known as the Lions – that would be the Southeastern Louisiana Lions. Whatever. How do you even count this 52-6 win in Mississippi’s rankings?
So now we come to the pivotal moment where I have to make my selection. I am going to go away from the Mississippi hype; they need to prove it before I will jump on the turnip truck. South Carolina with the 3.5 points.
