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Texas A&M welcomes Ole Miss to Kyle Field for an 11 a.m. CDT kickoff on Saturday. The SEC West Division foes enter the showdown with identical 5-4 records. The Aggies are 3-3 in SEC play, while Ole Miss stands at 1-4.
The Aggies are looking to lock up a 10th consecutive bowl game, needing one more win to become bowl eligible. Only three SEC teams have longer streaks: Georgia (22), LSU (18), and Alabama (15).
Ole Miss remains on probation and is in the final year of its bowl ban, so every game is a bowl game as far as the Rebels are concerned.
On paper, this game appears to be a high-scoring contest that should provide excitement in College Station from beginning to end. Here are 10 bold predictions for Saturday’s game.
1. Aggies cover
Texas A&M, as of late this week, is a 13-point favorite over the Rebels. The Aggies will own this game in front of the home crowd and win going away. Though eight of the 10 meetings between the teams (the Aggies lead the series 7-3) have been decided by seven points or fewer, this one doesn’t fit in that category.
2. Take the under
That’s right, take the under (67). While both teams are capable of piling up the points, it will be a methodical Texas A&M team that controls the action and scores just enough to beat the spread, while Ole Miss just doesn’t have the ball enough to push the total points past 67.
3. Trayveon Williams goes off
A&M head coach Jimbo Fisher talks a lot about balance on offense. But when you have a running back like Williams, it might become difficult to throw the ball as many times as the Aggies will run it on Saturday. Williams needs 69 yards to reach 1,000 for the season. He’ll do that in the first half and become just the fifth Aggie in school history to record two 1,000-yard seasons.
4. Punter Braden Mann takes the day off
The Texas A&M punter leads the nation by more than 2 yards with his 51.3 average per punt. But given Texas A&M’s ability to run the football with Williams, Kellen Mond and a stable of capable backs, the Aggies just might allow Mann to take the day off. If he does have to punt, it won’t be more than once per half, and there’s a good chance it won’t even be that often.
5. Aggies stuff the run
Ole Miss running back Scottie Phillips is averaging 103 yards per game this season. But he runs up against an Aggies defense that has given up the fewest yards on the ground (733) among SEC teams, and that’s nearly 200 yards fewer than Alabama (919). The Aggies held Kentucky’s Benny Snell Jr. to a season-low 60 yards as well as limiting Clemson’s Travis Etienne to just 44. Look for the Aggies to do the same with Phillips, stopping the run portion of the RPO. Alabama held Phillips to 44 yards. He remains under 50 for the game on Saturday.
6. Texas A&M piles up the first downs
This is an Aggies team that knows how to maintain possession and therefore roll up the first downs. They lead the SEC, averaging 26.2 first downs per game. Look for Texas A&M to surpass that mark and break 30 first downs for only the third time this season (40 vs. Northwestern State, 32 vs. UL-Monroe).
7. Ole Miss QB Jordan Ta’amu doesn’t disappoint
The Rebels’ signal-caller has to be eager to face an Aggies pass defense that ranks 11th in the SEC in total passing yardage allowed this season (2,192). Ta’amu reached the 3,000-yard mark in passing in his last game and has thrown for 370 or-more yards in three of his last four games. He won’t quite reach those heights, but Ta’amu will surpass his season average of 330 yards per game. That would give him eight 300-yard passing games, tying Chad Kelly for the all-time single-season record at Ole Miss.
8. Rebels receiver A.J. Brown the G.O.A.T.
Brown is enjoying another outstanding season and is currently sixth in the nation in receiving yards (920). His 2,584 career receiving yards rank third in Ole Miss program history, and he is just 63 yards shy of passing Shay Hodge and becoming the Rebels’ all-time leading receiver. He gets that on Saturday, possibly in the first half, and adds to his total of five games of more than 100 receiving yards, surpassing 1,000 for a second consecutive season, the first wideout in Ole Miss history to accomplish the feat.
9. Rebels to get fewer opportunities
Ole Miss can score in a hurry, and they’ll need to on Saturday. Texas A&M is a ball hog when it comes to time of possession. That makes things difficult for Ta’amu and the Ole Miss offense. The Aggies have limited the opposition to 53.9 plays per game on average. Look for that number to dip below 50 as the Rebels become severely limited on their opportunities.
10. Ole Miss linebacker Mohamed Sanogo has career game
Already seventh in the SEC with an average of 8.4 tackles per game, Sanogo will have unlimited opportunities on Saturday and because of it will pile up the tackles. His single-game career high is 16, set against Auburn. He breaks that mark with an incredibly busy day on Saturday.
Glenn Sattell is an award-winning freelance writer for Saturday Down South.
