FINAL FEELINGS: Kirby Smart, Georgia Bulldogs Travel to Middle Earth, Take on Mizzou
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ATHENS - Kirby Smart and the No. 1 Georgia Bulldogs head to Middle Earth to take on the Missouri Tigers on Saturday night. Here are our Final Feelings heading into the contest.
Matt’s Final Feelings: It’s that time of the week. Final Feelings time.
So Georgia didn’t play their best last weekend against Kent State. I wasn’t able to watch a single snap, but the scoreboard looked ugly for a while. After watching highlights, I don’t think their play last week should be overly concerning. Kent State was a lot better than people think, and I don’t expect the Bulldogs to come out struggling against Missouri this weekend.
At the end of the day, when Georgia played important games, against No. 11 Oregon and SEC opponent South Carolina, they beat their ass. The same will happen in Columbia this weekend. They need more from the receivers and the backs over the next several weeks, but they should still score at least 40 points on offense against a not-so-great Tiger defense. Defensively, Georgia should be just fine once again.
Before I give a score prediction, let me quickly recap my vacation…
Canada sucks. Montreal sucks. Quebec City is cool for 24 hours. It’s just not for me. I’ve been to both places twice, and I’m excited to never go back. I’m excited to be back home and plan on watching college football all day Saturday and the NFL on Sunday. That was the last time I’ll ever go on a trip during football season. (👀) We made some nice memories, but it’s never fun missing an entire weekend of football.
Back to Missouri. This is a team that lost an UGLY game to a bad Auburn team. Both teams deserved to lose that game. Missouri doesn’t have the talent, depth, or anything that should keep them in this ballgame. After a lackluster performance against Kent State, I expect Georgia to come out firing and dominate another SEC opponent in easy fashion.
Give me a 42-10 win for the Dawgs.
Now, I won’t be there to cover it, but Dean and Ryan will be up there for the game. I know they’ve been really excited to make the trip up there. I expect them to have an easy trip where absolutely nothing goes wrong. I’ll be pushing out content from the house and keeping my eyes on the rest of the games.
Speaking of other games…
Alabama’s a solid team, but are they really 17 points better than Arkansas? I don’t think so. Even after a tough loss to the Aggies, I still like the Razorbacks and think Sam Pittman’s crew give Alabama a fight. I think the Tide rolls to a win, but I’m taking Arkansas +17 in this one.
I’m still not completely sold on Michigan. They’ll beat Iowa because the Hawkeyes refuse to score points, but it won’t be pretty. I think Iowa covers the +11 in a really low-scoring, ugly game.
Kentucky and Ole Miss could be fun to watch. The Rebels are 7-point favorites, and I think that’s a little too much. I think they’ll win the game, but I expect it to come down to the wire. Give me Kentucky +7.
Aggies are underdogs to Mississippi State? The Bulldogs are a decent team but I think A&M goes into Starkville and knocks off the Bulldogs. I’ll take A&M +4.
Sooners bounce back and cover the -6.5 points against TCU.
I hate to say it, but the Braves are in trouble. They dropped a game to the Mets on Wednesday and are one game back heading into the big series this weekend. The Braves need a sweep. Winning the series will have them tied with the Mets heading into the final series of the season, but with the Mets getting the terrible Washington Nationals to end the regular season, the Braves need to have a lead in the series after this weekend if they want to win the East. It can still happen, but I think they need to sweep the Mets for it to happen.
The Georgia Bulldogs WIN the 2021 NATIONAL TITLE!
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Ryan’s Final Feelings: I am looking forward to going to this game. Don’t get me wrong. I love visiting new places, new campuses and new stadiums, but our travel plans are not ideal.
Dean and I scheduled flights out of St. Louis for Sunday morning around 8 AM or something like that. We did that under the assumption that the kickoff was going to be earlier in the day, but it ended up being 7:30 EST. That means I will not be getting any sleep, much like the Orange Bowl. Dean was the one clicking the buttons, but I was cheering for him on the sideline as he did. Lesson learned for the billionth time: don’t make assumptions.
I’ve been going through it the last two weeks. The icing on the cake was when my apartment flooded a couple days ago. The dudes that live above us had a pipe burst. It smells weird, the ceiling is messed up, the carpet is gross, items were destroyed, and I am unhappy. It was like walking around in the little kid’s pool.
Moving onto the Georgia Bulldogs…
It’s pretty simple. Georgia is significantly better than Missouri. This is not the Missouri of ten years ago that was competing for SEC championships. This is a Missouri that is messing around with Auburn (also a disaster) in double overtime and losing!
I admit, I haven't watched much of the Tigers this season, but I have seen enough to know that they just aren’t going to compete with Georgia. These programs are too far apart.
Let’s go back to the Kent State game here for just a second. If just a handful of plays go the other way, the Dawgs come out of that with a 50 piece and an extremely decisive win.
I know I keep predicting them to score a lot of points, but that is what the Bulldogs are capable of. This week, they are on the road, they won’t have as much family around, they are traveling with fewer players, and the primetime kickoff gives them more time to get their minds and bodies right going into the matchup.
I have Georgia winning 51-10. They easily cover the 28.5-point spread. If they have a lot of turnover issues and struggle against the Tigers, then maybe the Dawgs are not as good as we thought. I still think they are the best team in the country until proven otherwise.
College Gameday will be in Clemson for their game against NC State. I don’t think those Tigers are special, but I don’t think very highly of NC State either. I was told great things about the Wolfpack this offseason, but I am just not seeing it so far. Give me the Clemson Dabos.
Some other Tigers are playing each other. I like LSU over Auburn. Auburn is awful.
Alabama is favored by 17.5 in Fayetteville, but Arkansas is no slouch. I think Alabama is missing something. They have a really tough stretch of games here over the next few weeks. I do like the Crimson Tide to win this one, but I don’t think they cover.
Right now, I think that Ohio State is better than Alabama. I would put Bama at third overall. Ohio State is very explosive. Marvin Harrison Jr. is for real. They are doing it without Jaxon Smith-Njigba. What I will say about Smith-Njigba is that I think he’s overrated, but his production last year is not to be ignored. Is CJ Stroud better than Bryce Young? I would LOVE to watch that game, and we very well might in a few months.
Kentucky in Oxford is interesting to me. I hope Kentucky wins just because I want Georgia to play top teams consistently. I am not giving a prediction. I just want to see the result. Ole Miss is favored.
How about this weather (not the hurricane)? I am loving it. I am happiest from October to March. That stretch contains football, basketball, the holidays, cold weather, beautiful trees and my birthday. It's the elite half of the year. I like spring and summer, but they are overhyped.
The Georgia Bulldogs WIN the 2021 NATIONAL TITLE!
Check out DAWGSTRUCTION NOW!
Dean’s Final Feelings: Anyone watching the Auburn-Missouri game from a week ago can tell you that neither team is any good. Someone had to win the game, and it was Auburn... and in catastrophic fashion. That said - Auburn felt like they could bully Missouri by opening the game with 15 consecutive runs.
That seemed to work at first, but Missouri got its act together and stopped the run. After all, in the SEC if you want to stop the run, it seems like you can (2020 UGA-State is a good example). The problem is the thing that’s taken over the SEC - the passing game.
Missouri is adequate at best passing the ball. Auburn, with its current quarterback, is bad at it. If Bryan Harsin thinks Robby Ashford is going to scramble his way to winning in the SEC… that seemed to either be the “plan” against Missouri - or what turned out to happen.
He was Auburn’s leading rusher going 46 total yards on 15 attempts, two of which were sacks.
By the way - that game was a sackfest - with eight total in the game. Yikes. It was just bad football. I don’t see Missouri, a team that’s not great to start with, and now not playing super great is going to stick with this Georgia team.
I have Georgia (-28) winning and covering on the road. Missouri doesn’t do any one thing particularly well. I think their 40-12 loss to Kansas State is the barometer on how bad Georgia will win the game. That game was in the Little Apple. This game is in Middle Earth.
Doesn’t matter. Dawgs on Top - and by a lot.
I will be repeating that phrase a week from now when Auburn comes to town.
Speaking of which - ALERT: Dean and Ryan will be live at Paloma Park in Athens the Friday before the Auburn game from 4 to 7 (that’s happy hour for those of you with a thirst). We will also stream the three-hour event live on our You Tube channel.
Now, I am not certain I can talk about the Dawgs for three hours in a row - I am skeptical of my ability to make the show fun for that long. But if Kirby and the Dawgs can play for three hours; we can talk for three hours.
If you plan on being in Athens the Friday of the Auburn game consider that a Dawg Post meet up. Please tell your mother-in-law to wash her undergarments before throwing them at us on the stage. We’ve had problems with that in the past, and I’m running out of space at home where I keep the clean ones.
Taking a look around the landscape of college football… right now I have it:
1. Georgia
2. Ohio State
3. Bama
4. Not sure, but prolly not Clemson or USC (BTW, you can get tickets to the SC-Arizona State game for $60).
I need to watch the rest of the Clemson-Wake game, but I was told it was very, very unimpressive as it relates to the Rock Rubbers. Meanwhile, the Trojans got what I thought was a really solid win at Oregon State (I stayed up to watch the conclusion of it at like 1:45 AM EST). It was entertaining. But if we are going into overtime with Wake, and saving ourselves against the Beavs… are we really a top-four team?
You get one of those games in a season if the season is going to be special. I’ve seen Clemson enough to know that I am skeptical they get through the regular season unscathed. The ACC is stronger this season, and it looks like there are any number of games the Taters can lose along the way.
Answer me this: Would Clemson beat Kentucky? Would they beat the Vols? Probably? I’m not sure. Would USC? Yes? The School Bus Riders host NC State in a game where they are favored by single digits in an ACC home game for only the fifth time in the last ten years. In fact, Clemson has only been a single-digit favorite once in the last five seasons (2017 Auburn, +6).
They’ve won all those games straight up. I’ll take the Taters to cover. NCSU is probably the better team, but I don’t trust them. Clemson’s loss will probably come out of the blue as usual.
We know Oklahoma wouldn’t beat Tennessee or Kentucky. Brent Venables better get it together real quick, or this is going to be a long year. Kansas State whipped their ass Saturday, and don’t look now, but a noon kick against TCU (+6) won’t be tons of fun, either. Anyway, there’s nothing wrong with the Alamo Bowl.
Remember the Alamo? That turned out pretty well. Too soon?
That was before Texas was a state, and back when Oklahoma was just a bunch of dirt - some things never change.
Ole Miss-Kentucky will tell us a lot about both teams. The Cats were supposed to get to this point undefeated. And they’ve been a little up and down in doing so. The Rebs? They really haven’t played anyone - their one-score win over Tulsa wasn’t ideal last weekend.
Bama at Arkansas? I will believe Alabama losing to the Hogs when I see it. And I have to tell you that even if it happens I am not sure that I will see it. Do they have TVs in Missouri?
Oklahoma State-Baylor (-2) could be the best game of the weekend. I watched the Bears fall to BYU late earlier this year. These are probably the best two teams in the Big 12 (sorry Kansas).
One-win team and current European champion Northwestern travels to Penn State (-26.5) for an afternoon snoozer. Meanwhile Wake (+7) travels to FSU for a showdown in one of the ACC divisions. This will tell us if the Noles have a real crack at winning that side of the league.
A&M travels to State (-4). I like the Bulldogs here to cover.
How about your Dallas Cowboys? I love the new QB - he understands how to play that spot, and that matters. Take Dallas (-3) to cover against Washington in Jerah World Sunday at 1.
Have your heard the NFL could move the Chiefs’ game at Tampa to Minneapolis? No one wins in that scenario. But you can win if you take Kansas City (-1) to cover no matter where the game is UPDATE: Looks like Tampa; DOUBLE UPDATE: Take the Chiefs.
For the record I will be watching UCLA-Washington on Friday night - that’s “if” Hurricane Ian stays out of my way. And if we know anything about Hurricanes its that they get blown out by the Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders (Rest in Peace in Peace, Bad Brad).
Kirby and the Dawgs roll in Middle Earth - you heard here first.
