Tennnessee Vols +8 3.3% play
It’s clear that Tennessee’s defense has improved from last year, and Georgia’s defense has taken a small step back that has gone really unnoticed to this point. Josh Heupel’s offenses have had success against Kirby Smart’s defenses in the past putting up 27 points in 2016 at Missouri, and 28 in 2017, and while Tennessee only scored 17 that was a Georgia defense that was one of the best in the past 25 years.
Georgia’s pass defense will be the key here they rank 3rd, but they have faced an average opponent pass offense ranking 83rd. They are 119th in sack % and just lost their leading sack player for the season. Kent State, which runs a similar up tempo offense that relies on spacing had a lot of success against Georgia and it was a 32-22 game with 6 minutes to play. Alabama in the SEC Championship caught Georgia off guard and ran up-tempo and put 41 points on the defense. I think Tennessee’s offense has taken the next step under Heupel and I think they have another big day on offense.
Defensively Tennessee has been a rock against the run, which is exactly what Georgia typically relies on. Stetson Bennett is not the type of guy going to win you the game, and he doesn’t have the receiving threats at WR he had last year. Most of their offense comes via the TE group. Tennessee got a little healthier last week in the secondary and it definitely showed as they had their best defensive performance of the season against a very good Kentucky offense behind Will Levis, who was running a top 25 passing offense. I think this is going to be a very entertaining game, and I feel like even though public money is on Tennessee we will see them cover here and possibly shock Georgia and win outright.
