Biscuits & SEC Week 7 game-by-game recaps 2024
Week 7 lived up to the hype with four games in the SEC going down to the wire.
By: Bossman, Hammer, Waco Kid
Another week that will damn near make your heart stop. We saw games go down to the wire in Tuscaloosa, Knoxville, and Baton Rouge, not to mention in multiple big games around the country, like Penn State-USC and Oregon-Ohio State. Week 7 was billed as one of the biggest college football days in years, and it definitely lived up to the hype.
Let’s check in on how the B&S crew fared in our weekly pick’em:
A good week straight up for the crew, but against the spread there are still some struggles. Waco Kid is still solidly in the lead ATS, but he can’t get comfortable. Hammer maintained his lead in the straight-up column and will look to build on his lead in Week 8. Shoutout to the Waco Kid who picked Vandy over Kentucky. Gutsy call! But he also picked OU over Texas so…that’ll keep his head in check.
Let’s hit the recaps.
Bossman: If last week didn’t give you enough pause, we’re now in full-on panic mode in Tuscaloosa. South Carolina is not a bad team, but Alabama is expected to blow teams like the Gamecocks out of the water, especially at home. That’s the expectation of the fanbase, at least. So, being on the ropes with South Carolina having a real chance to win the game in the waning moments of the fourth quarter is not going to go over well. Plus, Kalen DaBoer wore a SWEATSHIRT THIS WEEK, after wearing a t-shirt last week. Does this man have any respect for the game or his ancestors? For America? It’s a serious question people are asking. As for the game, the Tide did just enough to win, but it was sloppy yet again. Credit to South Carolina who hung with big bad Alabama to the final whistle, but the top story is “What is wrong with the Tide?” It doesn’t get any easier here for Bama - they get Tennessee next week and Mizzou in two weeks.
Hammer: I suppose it’s time to no longer treat Alabama like the Alabama we came to know under Nick Saban. For the last two weeks, I’ve been expecting this team to get out of whatever funk they are under and start dominating. It hasn’t happened. The Tide are still 5-1 so the sky isn’t falling, and they won this weekend. But holy smokes this was close. South Carolina deserves a ton of credit for pushing Alabama to the brink in Bryant-Denny. The Gamecock defense played lights out, especially that front seven, who tallied nine TFLs and four sacks. They also held Alabama to 104 yards rushing on 38 carries. Jalen Milroe never looked comfortable and he threw two picks. For the last two weeks, even in the Georgia victory, the Bama defense seemed to be the problem. On Saturday, the Bama defense played much better, holding South Carolina to 374 total yards. The Gamecocks did well on third down though, converting 7/15, which is becoming a concerning trend for the Bama defense. I’m not sure what the rest of the season will hold for Alabama, but I’m expecting many more close games. They are just not the dominant team we came to know under Nick Saban, and in reality, they haven’t been for a few years. Alabama has played so many one-score games in the last couple of years. While watching this game, it really felt like South Carolina should have won. But “should haves” don’t count and Alabama escaped, while South Carolina suffered yet another heartbreaking loss.
Waco Kid: Defense. Defense. Defense. At one time the Tide was a vaunted defensive unit but nowadays it seems it is their main downfall. Look Bama didn’t give up a ton of points but they aren’t lighting up the scoreboard lately either, The days of Saban holding teams to under 10 are over. I thought their offense could score at a more efficient rate but South Carolina proved me wrong for the second straight week and almost upset the crimson and white. Alabama continues to find ways to win but it’s not pretty. With the realignment, we could be looking at a Big 12-type atmosphere…I hope not but all signs point towards the apocalypse.
Bossman: I expected this one to be a blowout and it was. It took Texas most of the first half to get things going on offense, but after a late second-quarter TD and then ANOTHER one to go up 21-3 after an OU fumble inside the Texas red zone, this one was cooked. Quinn Ewers didn’t play as well on Saturday as he acted in the Dr. Pepper Fansville commercial, but Horns shouldn’t be too concerned. It was his first game back after missing the last two games with injury, and he should be back in top form soon. Plus, how much can you really complain after pummeling your rival by over 30 points? Texas has a good defense and frustrated Oklahoma all day, which is obvious by the score, but this OU offense is hapless. I know they were missing their top five wide receivers, but come on…this is Oklahoma. They shouldn’t be losing to Texas 34-3. Ever. Did they move on from Jackson Arnold too quickly? Maybe. Either way, Brent Venables has a mess on his hands. The Sooners are in serious jeopardy of missing out on a bowl with their remaining schedule.
Hammer: I picked Oklahoma to cover here. Translation, I am an idiot. I knew the Sooners couldn’t score much, but was holding out hope their defense could keep this game close. I was underestimating how bad Oklahoma’s offense was. I understand the injuries at wide receiver have really impacted this offense, but that was still pathetic. Michael Hawkins is not ready to operate this offense. They have no playmakers, no offensive line and they turn the ball over. Honestly, Oklahoma better hope they make it to a bowl this season. On the Texas side, this was another good win. Dominating your rival 34-3, regardless of circumstances and how bad OU is right now, is a great showing. Texas dominated every facet of this game and sent Oklahoma out to pasture.
Waco Kid: I just wanted Texas to lose. They aren’t as great as everyone says but OU is bad. These are two teams switching conferences, one with an easy schedule and one without. The Longhorns have a great path if they can get past the next week. They won’t…UGA will mop the floor and spread orange and white all over it but it will be a highly anticipated game that won’t live up to the hype. Good luck Texas on your one hard game of the season.
Bossman: The spread (UGA -34.5) was going to be tough to cover, but I thought they could do it against this Mississippi State team. However, it’s time for me to stop judging teams by what they are in September. Is Mississippi State good? No, they aren’t. But they also are not a total pushover. If you’re a Dawgs fan, this is not what you wanted to see. A beleaguered Mississippi State team, walking into Sanford Stadium, with a UGA team that should be hungry…this will be a blowout, right? Wrong. Carson Beck threw two picks, was matched step-for-step by State freshman QB Michael Van Buren Jr., and the Bulldogs defense gave up 31 points to a team that scored 17 against Toledo. I know I know…we can’t define a team in September. But for a team known for their lockdown defense, it’s surprising to see State put up this many points against the Dawgs. It looked like Georgia was well on their way to a blowout, leading 34-10 early in the third quarter, but then 14 unanswered points from the Bulldogs in maroon and white made it interesting. Seven of those points were after Mississippi State cashed in after Carson Beck’s second interception. There are no moral victories, but the Bulldogs can start to build confidence after playing Texas and Georgia tough in back-to-back weeks. The Bulldogs have plenty of questions coming out of this one, mostly on offense and the secondary. The Georgia defense gave up multiple big pass plays, including ones of 72, 42, and 35. Very unlike the Bulldogs, unless they’re playing a top-five team. Mississippi State looks like they’ve found their QB of the future. Great performance from the true freshman against the Dawgs. Still, it’s a W for Georgia who now will turn their sites to Austin, where they take on #1 Texas next week.
Hammer: Shout out to Mississippi State in this one. The Bulldogs have been written off for several weeks now, and rightly so. They stink. However, a lot of teams stink and completely give up. Not Mississippi State. There is no quit in Starkville, which is a good sign, especially considering they lost their starting QB to injury for the rest of the season a few weeks ago. This team went into Athens as 34.5 point underdogs, with a backup QB, and only lost by 10. Bravo. On the Georgia side, something is still off with this team. I can’t put my finger on it but they are not bringing the juice we are accustomed to. Their defense should not give up 31 points to Mississippi State’s backup QB at home. I know Lebby runs a good offense and had a good game plan, but that shouldn’t happen when you are Georgia. On offense, Carson Beck still seems out of sorts. He misses Brock Bowers and Ladd McConkey. Beck finished with some pretty big numbers, going 36/48 for 459 yards and three TDs, but he also threw two interceptions. I know the numbers were solid, but he still seems off to me as does the entire Georgia team. Take the win, move on, and get ready to play your tails off in Austin next weekend cause that effort will not beat Texas.
Waco Kid: Of course, the Dawgs weren’t going to cover a 34.5 spread in an SEC matchup. Not many could but outside of Carson Beck’s few mistakes and two interceptions, they were dominant. Oddly enough the SEC seems to be struggling to find their top team. Usually, we look to Georgia or Alabama but now A&M sits atop the conference with one loss to Notre Dame. The nation would love to see a year where the SEC does not run the nation but there are so many on the brink that we might see at least six in the playoffs. So if the plan was to leave the conference out and create space, it did not work.
Bossman: Man, YOU HAD THEM. Billy Napier and the Gators led this game for three quarters before Tennessee tied it up with 1:47 to go in the third, 10-10. The Gators just didn’t have enough at the end of the day, and Tennessee barely had enough to put away Florida. Should Billy Napier have gone for it? Hammer and I were discussing it in real-time while watching this game live. Florida scores a TD to make it 17-16 with 29 seconds left in the game. Billy Napier kept the offense on the field to go for two before Tennessee called timeout to regroup. After the timeout, Napier sent out the field goal unit to tie the game and send it to overtime, choosing to live to fight another day. In OT, Florida lost four yards on three plays and shanked a 47-yard field goal, opening the door for Tennessee to push the throttle and finish off the Gators. So - should Napier have gone for it? Hindsight is 20/20, but probably. But…what’s done is done. Tennessee escapes with a good win, but many questions remain for the Vols. Nico Iamaleava still doesn’t look totally comfortable in this Heupel offense, at a time when it feels like it should be starting to click. I’m not too worried about him in the long term. The talent is there, he’s got a rifle for an arm, and with time and experience, I expect the offense to start humming in due time. But it needs to happen quickly if Tennessee is going to make a run at the playoffs.
Hammer: Another shoutout here goes to Florida for competing their tails off in this one. Another team who has been written off for weeks, simply refused to quit. They played hard as hell and almost pulled off a stunning upset in Neyland. In my mind, Napier should have gone for two at the end of the game when they scored a TD and opted to kick the extra point and go to overtime. Graham Mertz played pretty well in this one but went down with an injury. So DJ Lagway is in the game and he marches Florida down the field to score with 29 seconds left…and Napier thought it was a better plan to extend the game in Knoxville and go to overtime? As a 15.5-point underdog? Come on man. Let Lagway use his athleticism and go for two and the win here. The Gator defense deserves a ton of credit for figuring some things out. Earlier this season, the Gator defense couldn’t stop the run at all. They stopped UCF a week ago but I chalked that up to UCF not being any good. Well, they did it again against a better team and rushing attack, holding Tennessee to 143 yards rushing and 3.3 YPC. This leads right into my next point, Nico is not ready. He went 16/26 for 169 yards and one interception in this game. The talent is there. He makes a few throws a game that show how strong his arm is and he looks the part. However, he is not making enough plays right now to be an effective QB. Until Nico and this offense figure some things out, the Vols will continue playing in really close games.
Waco Kid: Tennessee has had a fall from grace. Losing to Arkansas and then keeping it close against a subpar Florida team. The Gators may not look bad on paper but when you watch them, they aren’t great. On the flip side, the Vols are supposed to be a top-tier team and have not performed well the past two weeks. Heupel has to get this program back on track because he was looking at a natty and now is looking at a saddy. If they can bounce back they will still make playoffs but the way they are playing now leaves little hope for greater things.
Bossman: WHAT. A. GAME. Night in Death Valley with a top-15 matchup. These are the types of games you live for as a college football fan. I nearly picked the score (30-26), but I had the wrong team on the winning end. This was a dog fight from the opening whistle. Here’s a stat for you: Ole Miss led this game for all but 27 seconds. And they lost. HOW? Only college football. The biggest thing I took from this game was LSU’s maligned secondary. It looks like Blake Baker is making some progress with the defensive backfield. The Tigers secondary bent but didn’t break all night, and in key situations, they came up big. They outplayed their counterparts from Ole Miss, even though the Rebels picked off Garrett Nussmeier twice. Nuss still threw for three TDs, including the game-tying 26-yarder to Aaron Anderson and the 25-yarder on the first LSU play in OT to win the game. Hard to argue with the result - it’s damn tough to win in Death Valley at night, this LSU team is improving by the week and is a real threat. This will not go over well in Oxford though, the Ole Miss faithful paid a lot for this roster and had playoff stars in their eyes. That dream isn’t over yet, but the door is only cracked. Lane Kiffin’s got a big coaching job on his hands now - he’s got to keep this locker room of transfers together and focused or it could unravel.
Hammer: Just another Saturday night game in Death Valley, right? Well, not really because this was an instant classic. But the result was a typical Saturday night in Death Valley. I picked LSU because it was a night game in Tiger Stadium and LSU was off a bye, while Ole Miss was playing their 7th consecutive game. This was not easy, obviously. LSU fought tooth and nail in this one to sneak away with a win, despite never leading for a single second until they scored a TD in overtime to win. There were a few key things that this game ultimately came down to. First, the offensive lines. LSU’s front seven wreaked havoc on Ole Miss, totaling nine TFLs and six sacks. Jaxson Dart took a beating for the third consecutive week because Ole Miss simply can’t pass protect right now, and it's debilitating to their offense. On the flip side, Ole Miss only recorded three TFLs and zero sacks. Nussmeier was under pressure at times, sure, but he never took a sack. And finally, Ole Miss left too many points on the board. On the night, Ole Miss got into the red zone six times and only scored one TD and added two field goals, meaning three red zone trips resulted in zero points. And they lost the game in overtime. That is simply not good enough. LSU’s defense deserves a ton of credit, and the injury of Tre Harris probably helped too, but the Tiger defense was playing with their hair on fire. Tiger linebacker Whit Weeks tallied 18 tackles, including a sack and two TFLs on the night. That is winning football. And so was Garrett Nussmeier. Nuss threw two interceptions and was only 22/51, but when it mattered most, he delivered, finishing with 337 yards and three TDs. An incredible clutch performance from Nussmeier helped seal the win.
Waco Kid: LSU is still a monster, they have fallen in close games but may have one of the best-underrated teams in the nation. With Nussmeier behind center, they can go the distance. The dude threw for over 330 yards and three touchdowns. He reads and dissects and that’s dangerous for any team going against the Tigers. I picked LSU in this one and it will be hard for me to go against them in the future.
Bossman: The only week I haven’t doubted Vandy was against Georgia State. And that was the only week I was wrong about them and should have doubted. I think Clark Lea has been reading Biscuits & SEC and has it out for Bossman, because he must be using this column as bulletin board material. It’s the only explanation, other than Diego Pavia, as to why the Commodores are running through the SEC like sh*t through a tin horn. “Hey boys, not sure if you saw what Bossman said this week. He said Kentucky was going to cover against us. How dumb is this guy?” That’s what a trusted source told me Clark Lea said to the team after practice late last week. Great coach, great guy. Count me officially on the Vandy train, Diego Stones is a BALLER. If I was him, I’d be the Mayor of Kid Rock’s bar or whatever Morgan Wallen’s bar is on Broadway. I’d be riding the Big Green Tractor at Aldean’s with the prettiest girl I could find. Anyway, this ended up being nothing about football, but Vanderbilt gets a great win against Kentucky and keeps on rolling. No letdown here! Kentucky is again left picking up the pieces wondering how they can be consistent and stack wins. Beat #6 Ole Miss? Cool, here’s a loss to Vanderbilt.
Hammer: Shame on me. I doubted Vandy and Deigo Pavia AGAIN! With all the attention and press clippings Vandy got over the last week, I figured we were in for a letdown. Diego Pavia has been all over the place doing a million interviews and even started his own podcast. With all that going on off the field, a road trip for a night game at Kentucky seemed like it was a perfect setup for a reality check. But Diego Football and Vanderbilt shut me, Kentucky, and every other doubter up by not only covering the 13.5-point spread but winning outright. It wasn’t pretty, and Vandy only managed 288 total yards but they won the damn game. The Commodores won the turnover batter 2-1 and won the time of possession 34:35 to 25:25. The ‘Dore defense played well and limited Kentucky’s struggling offense to 322 total yards. Penalties also killed Kentucky in this one. The Wildcats tallied 12 penalties for 105 yards while Vandy only had 5 for 57. The bottom line is Vandy was the more disciplined team here, and they beat Kentucky straight up. For Mark Stoops, after his team had a bye week, to come out play like that is a serious disappointment. He was out-coached and the better team won. A tough pill to swallow for Big Blue Nation. So tough, in fact, that Mark Stoops actually complained about not having as many NIL resources as Vandy. VANDY! Just let that nonsense sink in.
Waco Kid: Suckers. I’m done betting against Vandy. As long as Pavia is at the helm anything is possible. We learned this with Johnny Football. There are just some players that transcend what is possible and the fathomable outcomes and he is one. It’s not even the stats, it’s what he brings to the table that terrifies defensive coordinators. How do you plan for a wild man? You can’t. You just hold on and enjoy the ride for a year or two. That’s what is happening, a damn revolution in Nashville. He has this team and fan base believing and dammit, I’m a fan too. Clark Lea has them playing at a high level and the ‘Dores will continue this streak throughout the season. I thought they’d be bottom tier at the beginning but they could finish top tier SEC and dare I say make playoffs.
Other games in the SEC:
#21 Mizzou 45 - UMass 3
Byes:
Arkansas, Auburn, Texas A&M
