Week 13 Rooting Guide for Tennessee Fans

By Jon Reed

Earlier this week I outlined the help that Tennessee needed over the rest of the season. Go and read it for a big picture view.

This will be focusing solely on Week 13.

Week 12 was not kind to Tennessee. The Volunteers jumped out to a 10-0 lead on the road at Georgia; life was good. The Bulldogs went on a 31-7 run to end the game; life was bad.

The fallout from that game left Tennessee on the outside of the playoff club, stuck staring through the window longingly as the other teams sat huddled around the table eating a nice warm meal and sipping sweet red wine. That’s the sad news. The good news it that Tennessee hasn’t been sentenced to starve.

There are still plenty of ways Tennessee gets a reprieve and earns that invitation to eat.

Here’s what to root for:

1. Tennessee (HOME) embarrasses UTEP
It’s time for Josh Heupel to drop the hammer. It’s time for the offense to get their confidence back and finally put it all together. No, no one will be that impressed because it’s just UTEP, but a big, beautiful win is better than a close, uninspiring win.

And a little confidence boost before the season finale against Vanderbilt could do the boys good. The Vols are favored by 41.5.

2. Florida (HOME) over Ole Miss

We’re going to sing Rocky Top all night long if Lane Kiffin loses in the Swamp.

The Gators are getting to experience an end of season boost of morale now that their 5-star freshman qb has been thrusted into the starting lineup after Graham Mertz’s injury. The team responded by pounding Kentucky and besting Georgia for a half. Then, he went down and all hope looked lost. However, fate is fickle and thus the gods reversed course on what looked like a season ending injury. Lagway returned against LSU and was good enough to help lead Sun Belt Billy’s boys to a 27-16 win over LSU.

Now, we need that run to continue. A Florida win would be a deathblow to Ole Miss’s playoff chances. At the moment, I can make an argument that Tennessee should already be ranked higher than the Rebels. If they go into the Swamp and beat Florida? Eh, that probably dies. Yeah, I know they LOST TO KENTUCKY AT HOME, but another road win over a team that the Vols struggled with will pretty much close that argument in the committee’s eyes.

When has Lane Kiffin ever lost a big game?

Ole Miss is currently favored by 12.5.

3. Oklahoma (HOME) over Alabama

It clearly doesn’t matter to the committee that Tennessee beat Alabama. So, we obviously would like for Alabama to lose again. It’s the only way their playoff spot gets taken away.  I would say that this feels pretty hopeless, but I then remembered that Alabama lost to Vanderbilt. If you can lose to Vanderbilt, you can lose to anyone.

Alabama is currently favored by 13.5.

4. Minnesota (HOME) over Penn State

James Franklin does not usually lose these type of games. He is typically a bully when it comes to the mid-tier Big Ten teams and reserves his losing for actual good teams, not fake “good” teams that the second best conference in the country tries to use to prop themselves up.

If you’re looking for a reason to be positive, PJ Fleck has won his last two games coming off of a bye week. Earlier this year, the boat got rowed all over Maryland’s ass in a 48-23 victory. Last year, the Gophers out-Iowa’d Iowa in a 12-10 win. That Iowa team went on to go 10-2.

It’s still kind of mindboggling to me that Penn State is getting so much respect from the committee seeing how their best win is a very misleading 7 point loss at home to Ohio State. I assume that would end with a loss here too, but I haven’t ran the actual Michigan Math to see how the Wolverines play into this.

Penn State is currently favored by 11.5.

5. Ohio State (HOME) puts the belt to Indiana’s ass

I personally think that any type of loss here by Indiana should eliminate them from playoff contention, and it seems like more and more voices in the national media started talking about this very same thing this week. I’m not sure if the committee, that is led by the Big 10, will agree if Indiana looks competivive.

But I think that the temperature raises with every point that Ohio State wins by. This is literally the only important game that Indiana will play this year after they knowingly and strategically put together the worst nonconference schedule that any “contender” could possibly have dreamed up.

Expose these cowards, Buckeyes.

Ohio State is currently favored by 11.

6. Army OVER Notre Dame (neutral site)

I’m including this just because it would open up a playoff spot and because it’s somehow only a 14 point spread. I do not view this as feasible. I don’t think this has any chance of happening. There is absolutely no way that Army can even hang with Notre Dame, much less beat them.

It would be cool if they did. It’d be so cool that I would probably rank it as the second greatest sports moment for the troops, trailing only George W Bush’s 9/11 World Series first pitch.

Notre Dame is currently favored by 14.

7. Vanderbilt OVER LSU (home)

I am following a simple formula: I want all of the team’s on Tennessee’s schedule (except Alabama and Georgia) to win games and look good. LSU is also a team that is propping up both Alabama and Ole Miss. This would be a double whammy of success.

Tennessee finishing the season at a 7-4 Vanderbilt that beat Alabama and only lost by 3 to Texas would probably be considered a big win. Hell, it may get ranked Tennessee’s second biggest win.

There is a lot at stake this weekend. Let’s hope that we get a couple of things to go our way.