We thought it might play out this way back in the summer, and it turns out we were correct. Tennessee will be playing in a must win game on Saturday night when the Oklahoma Sooners come to town after taking two losses before the calendar turned to November.
An early game against Georgia was alway going to be tough, and despite the fact that Tennessee should have won that game, it still counts in the loss column. You also knew a trip to Tuscaloosa was going to be a challenge considering the Volunteers
haven’t won down there since 2003. The other game that really popped off the schedule was Oklahoma, which revamped its offense over the offseason.
Results of those three were always going to determine Tennessee’s College Football Playoff fate, and here we are.
Both sides enter this one at 6-2 overall, both on the razor’s edge of elimination. We saw last year teams like Alabama, Ole Miss and South Carolina get close to at-large bids at the end of the season, but ultimately just missed out on a spot. A ton is left to play out over the next month, but you better be 10-2 by the end of the season to truly have a shot.
Oklahoma seems like a team that’s trending down at a really bad time. By now you probably know about John Mateer, who is struggling to get back to being the same guy we saw in September after dealing with a thumb injury. The Sooners’ defense has been talked about at length as one of the best statistically in the country, but Lane Kiffin and Ole Miss poked plenty of holes in that unit last Saturday in Norman.
Just looking at the schedule, it’s entire possible this group has been propped up by some flat out bad offenses (Auburn, Texas, South Carolina). They’ll now get a chance to prove they’re for real against one of the best offenses in the nation in Knoxville.
Tennessee has been knocked by many in the media for not having a signature win, which is valid. They’ve scraped by against Mississippi State and Arkansas and blown out the rest as they should. Saturday serves as another chance to grab one of those big wins that the committee will like.
To this point, Tennessee can only truly hang its hat on having two of the “best losses” in the country. Down the stretch they’ll have chances to go get more big wins, with a tough road date at Florida left along with a potential showdown in Neyland with top ten Vanderbilt.
Tennessee sits 14th in the AP Poll this week, and the first batch of College Football Playoff rankings are set to come out next week. Big wins, good losses — all of that aside — just win and the rest will take care of itself.
Oklahoma and Tennessee are set for a 7:30 p.m. ET kickoff on ABC. The Volunteers are a three-point favorite.
