It seems there’s always a week, occurring around Week 3 or 4, that serves to humble the Predictions Dept. and bring the season record back into alignment with what would be considered a typical annual result. For us, that was certainly last week, although you can forgive us and everyone else who took North Carolina over Vanderbilt if we thought we had that one in the bag. This week, tough picks abound. Texas and Tennessee square off, Missouri heads to Mississippi State and on the other end of the spectrum, someone in the Vanderbilt-Auburn game is about to watch their season start slipping away.
Week 2 Record: 6-5 (54.6%)
2026 Season Record: 35-7 (83.3%)
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TULSA at ARKANSAS
Don’t look now, but Tulsa is 3-0 and that includes a win over Oklahoma State, who after losing to the Golden Hurricane in the season opener, found a way to beat Oregon the following week. Arkansas, on the other hand, is terrible. The Razorbacks are on track to probably finish the year as the SEC’s worst team. The question is, would you pick Arkansas to lose at home to Tulsa, which would be pulling off its second crazy upset in a month? That more than anything is why we’re probably going to stick with our preseason pick of the Hogs. Tulsa has enough game tape out there now that a second Oklahoma State situation probably isn’t going to happen. And while Arkansas got trounced by Georgia last week, it still wasn’t the total beatdown everyone expected; the Razorbacks scored 17 points on the Georgia defense and didn’t really quit.
Arkansas 30
Tulsa 23
SOUTH CAROLINA at ALABAMA
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VANDERBILT at AUBURN
All things considered, the Auburn loss to Florida shouldn’t have been considered much of a shock, and Auburn does seem to have a balanced offense capable of scoring points. Also, Vanderbilt was beaten by NC State until the miracle of miracles happened on the game’s last play, and we would take Auburn ten times out of ten in a matchup with the Wolfpack. Auburn’s injury report doesn’t look too bad, so given how many holes have popped up for Vanderbilt on both sides of the ball since the start of the season, we can’t justify going with the Cinderella story in back-to-back weeks. Alex Golesh probably gets his first conference win and keeps the wolves at bay – all the way to next Saturday, when Tennessee comes to town, followed by Georgia the following week, etc.
Auburn 33
Vanderbilt 24
MISSISSIPPI at FLORIDA
Florida is nowhere near Ole Miss at the moment, especially on defense, but how much of a hangover is the whole Oxford operation going through right now? In addition to the emotional roller coaster the Rebels were on since Saturday – if not weeks before – there was a substance-use tragedy that, according to reports from Ole Miss, upended campus life in general and things still aren’t back to normal. The game being on the road in Gainesville is another concern. Florida’s Jon Sumrall is the toast of the media at the moment, the next great thing who is in the process of resurrecting the Gator program. We’d like to pump the brakes on that a bit until Florida can look better on defense – giving up 39 to Auburn after Baylor held the Tigers to 17? – but Florida’s offense is good enough to make Ole Miss show up.
Ole Miss 30
Florida 27
OKLAHOMA at GEORGIA
The Oklahoma offense is a mess again, and QB John Mateer suddenly looks very average. Georgia didn’t play its best game in a win over Arkansas last week, but it was still a four-touchdown margin of victory on the road. Oklahoma’s defense is legit, and we’re going to be interested to see how Georgia’s offense looks when it isn’t playing against air. We wouldn’t be surprised to see this one uncomfortably close until the Bulldogs have time to make some in-game adjustments.
Georgia 31
Oklahoma 13
SOUTH ALABAMA at KENTUCKY
No one put up a bigger shocker than did the Wildcats last week, going into College Station and roasting the Texas A&M Aggies just a week after collapsing in the second half at home against Alabama. South Alabama narrowly knocked off Ohio last week, a week after losing to Tulane. The Jaguar defense needs help. By all rights, there really shouldn’t be any drama here – Kentucky should win it going away – but South Alabama, like in-state rival Troy, has developed a reputation as a sneaky out, especially when the opponent is coming off an emotional high and potentially looking ahead. This is a big moment for Will Stein in his first year as a head coach.
Kentucky 40
South Alabama 20
TEXAS A&M at LOUISIANA STATE
Here’s the Disappointment Bowl, featuring a Texas A&M team that put its fan base into a coma following a disaster of a performance against Kentucky, facing off against Lane Kiffin’s LSU Tigers, which folded against Kiffin’s former employer, Ole Miss. Mike Elko is hearing some grumblings for the first time, while LSU took a couple of big hits in the injury department, and now you have a situation where the loser of this game probably gets knocked out of the playoff picture very, very early. Until QB Marcel Reed starts playing better for the Aggies, we can’t justify taking them in games like this.
LSU 27
Texas A&M 17
MISSOURI at MISSISSIPPI STATE
Missouri managed to make Troy look more dangerous than it really is in a 27-17 win last week that was about as comfortable as watching people give blood inside a Red Cross van. Mississippi State, meanwhile, is undefeated and ranked, and has now won in back-to-back weeks on the road over Minnesota and South Carolina. The problem for the Bulldogs is the defense is still fairly downmarket; they’re outscoring people rather than flat-out beating them, and if anyone’s defense can come up with an answer for QB Kamario Taylor, the whole thing is likely to come to a crashing halt. The question is whether Missouri can be that team, especially with the running game still missing Ahmad Hardy. Will Mississippi State be looking ahead to Alabama?
Mississippi State 30
Missouri 28
TEXAS at TENNESSEE
How this ended up the 11 a.m. game is anyone’s guess. Parsing the statistical data, the Tennessee run defense is probably the key here, because the Volunteers have yet to really ratchet the pressure up on anyone’s running backs, and it’s not like the schedule has been Murderer’s Row up to this point. Texas is coming off a ho-hum 30-6 win over UTSA, but the relevant data point, of course, was the 21-point comeback against Ohio State the week before. We’re not super-confident about this pick, because we still have our questions about the general state of the Texas program relative to whether the Longhorns are truly championship material, but Tennessee has holes that just haven’t been exploited yet, and Texas is the first team the Volunteers have played that are capable of doing it.
Texas 31
Tennessee 23
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