Other than Eli Manning, there aren’t many College Football Playoff bracket predictions with Ole Miss as the last team standing.
But why can’t it be Ole Miss, the No. 6 seed with a 12-1 overall record and only loss to No. 3 Georgia, that ends up being the playoff team to ends it season with a win?
It’d be a great story. A team wins a national championship with a quarterback who was playing Division II a year ago? Plus, a coach who left the team before the CFP because he thought he had a better chance at winning a national title someplace else?
Someone will turn that season into a movie at some point.
So why aren’t there more predictions favoring the Rebels? The sportsbooks still have Georgia as a 6.5-point favorite to win Thursday night’s game. The Rebels’ former coach had a high opinion of those oddsmakers being right, so that’s one reason.
Here are three more reasons why Ole Miss fans should be worried about facing Georgia again in the quarterfinal round of the College Football Playoff.
Georgia run offense
Something about run defense in Mississippi is very challenging to the state’s biggest programs.
Ole Miss’s run defense ranks 13th amongst SEC teams with an average of 150.5 rushing yards allowed per game. Mississippi State is at the bottom of that list with almost 190 yards allowed per game.
It’s a huge weakness for both teams and one that Georgia has already exploited once this season.
In the October 18 matchup in Athens, the Bulldogs ran the ball 49 times for 221 yards, which led to nearly 40 minutes of possession in that game.
The Rebels haven’t showed a dramatic improvement in run defense since that game and Georgia’s rushing attack hasn’t regressed.
Strength vs. strength favors defense
The strength for Ole Miss is its offense that ranks third nationally in total offense (498.1 yards per game). The strength for Georgia is its defense that’s allowed just 15.9 points per game (11th nationally).
In playoff football games at any level, when two teams have their best units on the field at the same time it’s the defense that (usually) prevails.
Defense wins championships. How many times have we heard that cliché? A lot because there is some truth to it. Think about how big of an advantage it is knowing that if your offense scores 20 points, you’re basically guaranteed a win.
Of course, there are exceptions and nothing is guaranteed. But history favors the defense in strength vs. strength matchups.
Been here, won it
Ole Miss has a couple players and coaches with playoff experience. Wide receiver Harrison Wallace III was with Penn State in last season’s CFP. Quarterback Trinidad Chambliss won the Division II national title last season. Coach Pete Golding has been in four different playoffs at Delta State and Alabama.
But that experience doesn’t come close to a Georgia team that was in last year’s CFP. Add in the coaches remaining from the Bulldogs’ back-to-back national championships and this might as well be another game for them.
Georgia will be experienced not just playing in a big, important game, but also experience with all of the extracurricular activities involved with playoff and bowl games.
Ole Miss has some familiarity with it, but Georgia’s been a regular on the playoff stage for the last decade. The Rebels haven’t and the lights can be bright this high up the college football ladder.
