Last week’s record: 4-1 (80.0%)
Season record: 63-10 (86.3%)
It’s another short week in the SEC, with just five games on tap. There isn’t an easy pick on the board, though, save for maybe Vanderbilt-Ole Miss. Alabama is off, awaiting LSU next Saturday.
GEORGIA vs. FLORIDA (at Jacksonville, Fla.)
This game got suddenly very interesting when Georgia TE Brock Bowers was lost for a month to an ankle injury in the Bulldogs’ last win. With Bowers, Florida wouldn’t have been able to stay close in this game, but now it will be interesting to see how the Bulldogs fare without their most dangerous weapon. Tight ends aren’t usually so important to a team’s success, but few tight ends over the years have been as dynamic as Bowers has been. Florida has quietly stayed in contention in the SEC East and Georgia is one upset loss away from the whole thing flying wide open. Bowers won’t be back for at least two to three more weeks and won’t be 100 percent when he does return, at least not at first, so this game will be an indicator of what is to come.
Georgia 27
Florida 20
TENNESSEE at KENTUCKY
This is the perfect spot for Kentucky to rise up and pull an upset, because Tennessee still seems to be sulking over what it felt like was unfair treatment by game officials last week in Tuscaloosa. Despite the fact that such a position is high irony given the officiating debacle of Knoxville 2022, the more immediate problem for Tennessee is that if Josh Heupel can’t find a way to dispel those lingering frustrations, Kentucky is good enough to pull an upset. Everything would have to go right for Kentucky – the Wildcats didn’t take the next step up that everyone was expecting – but it’s not as big a hill to climb as it might sound. Tennessee is still in the SEC East race depending on what happens with Georgia over the next month without a healthy Brock Bowers, so there’s plenty left for the Volunteers to play for.
Tennessee 27
Kentucky 24
SOUTH CAROLINA at TEXAS A&M
There’s been a lot of attention devoted to the crisis at Arkansas this year, but South Carolina is having a meltdown of equal proportions. South Carolina is 2-5 and has lost three straight, but unlike Arkansas’ steady parade of close losses, two of those last three defeats suffered by the Gamecocks have come by way of the blowout. South Carolina’s best performance of the year is starting to look like the 24-14 loss suffered against Georgia in Week 3. Missouri manhandled South Carolina last week 34-12, and now the Gamecocks have to go on the road and visit a Texas A&M team that had the week off. That’s a hard objective to ask South Carolina to complete right now.
Texas A&M 23
South Carolina 17
VANDERBILT at MISSISSIPPI
Ole Miss dispatched Auburn on the road last week, always a tough feat to accomplish, and now the Rebels get to face a team that has a slightly better offense than the Tigers but a much worse defense. Vanderbilt has been a thorn in the Rebels’ side at times in recent years, but the Rebels’ season isn’t over yet and Lane Kiffin can probably keep his players focused on staying on Alabama’s bumper in the event the Crimson Tide gets knocked off a couple of times. Like most teams upset by Vanderbilt, it usually only happens when the Commodores have a future NFL player or two in the defensive front seven, and that doesn’t seem to be the case in 2023.
Ole Miss 33
Vanderbilt 17
MISSISSIPPI STATE at AUBURN
Auburn is making small improvements each week, and defensively the Tigers are already playing better than most observers thought they would in the preseason. The trick this week is to score enough points to stay in front of the Bulldogs. It doesn’t look like it would be so hard, as MSU rolls into this game fresh off a 7-3 snorefest against Arkansas, but the Bulldogs have a solid defense of their own and Auburn has nothing offensively it can count upon week to week. The game is in Jordan-Hare Stadium, though, which Auburn can always count on for at least a score’s worth of advantage on the board.
Auburn 23
Mississippi St. 20
IDLE: Alabama, Missouri, Arkansas, LSU
Follow Jess Nicholas on X at @TideFansJessN