Week 9 brings the final Saturday of October, as college football’s regular season gets deeper into the second half with so much still at stake. The College Football Playoff picture features too many possible scenarios to count, and spots in every Power Four conference championship game remain squarely up for grabs.
On the surface, this doesn’t appear to be a blockbuster week of games, but those weeks often tend to produce big surprises. A couple of the nation’s hottest teams could be particularly vulnerable, as No. 4 Alabama and No. 3 Texas A&M face challenging SEC road trips. The Crimson Tide are taking their six-game winning streak to South Carolina, while unbeaten A&M is traveling for an always tough night game at No. 20 LSU.
Elsewhere, No. 2 Indiana will be looking to stay unbeaten as it welcomes a resurgent UCLA club to town. The SEC docket also features two games between pairs of one-loss teams, as No. 8 Ole Miss travels to No. 13 Oklahoma and No. 10 Vanderbilt hosts No. 15 Missouri. The Rebels, Commodores and Tigers have never reached the CFP, but each of them are firmly in the picture entering Week 9 action.
Here is an early look at the odds for those games and many of the other Week 9 contests involving ranked teams as we dive deeper in the second half of the season.
Odds via FanDuel Sportsbook.
The big games
Ole Miss at Oklahoma (-3.5): Oklahoma is welcoming Ole Miss to Norman for the first time ever, as the pair of one-loss SEC teams square off in a high-stakes spot. This is the second leg of a brutal two-game road spurt for the Rebels, who fell 43-35 at Georgia in Week 8. Oklahoma is coming off a defensively dominant 26-7 win at South Carolina. The winner will stay firmly in the SEC title hunt, but the loser’s margin for error in the College Football Playoff hunt will vanish.
No. 4 Alabama (-13.5) at South Carolina: South Carolina could desperately use the jolt that stunning Alabama would provide. The Gamecocks (3-4, 1-4 SEC) are in the midst of a five-game stretch against top-15 league foes and were offensively lifeless in the first two games. The Crimson Tide are riding a six-game winning streak but can’t overlook a trip to Williams-Brice Stadium.
No. 15 Missouri at No. 10 Vanderbilt (-2.5): Looking for evidence that parity has arrived in college football? Look no further than a showdown between 6-1 Missouri and 6-1 Vanderbilt that carries significant College Football Playoff implications. The Tigers and Commodores are among the least-storied programs in the SEC, but they are both firmly in the mix for the CFP.
No. 3 Texas A&M (-2.5) at No. 20 LSU: LSU is backed into a corner, but playing a Death Valley night game gives the two-loss Tigers a fighting chance as they welcome the SEC’s last unbeaten team to town. The Aggies are 0-6 at Tiger Stadium since joining the SEC, but this team might be be built different, as the Aggies have scored 40+ points in road wins over Notre Dame and Arkansas this season.
UCLA at No. 2 Indiana (-24.5): This is where things start to get pretty scary for UCLA, as its final five games are against some of the Big Ten’s best competition. But after three straight league victories, the Bruins must be taken seriously. Their unbeaten run under interim coach Tim Skipper would cross over into legendary status if it grew to include a road win over the Hoosiers.
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