The most important factor on Saturday night might be ........

#27
#27
orangebloodgmc said:
I don't disagree; better to lead than to trail. However, just to play devil's advocate, if we DID fall behind early, it might just get us to open up our playbook more, rather than just try to run DSamp between the tackles over and over. We'll see. 🤷
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We tend to get very conservative with an early lead. See Oklahoma.
 
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#30
#30
chuck0303 said:
I hope we don't run Sampson into the line 3 straight times until we are sure of being able to block on their defense. You know they're going to be keying on him. Stop Sampson, stop Tennessee. Let's have some variety to keep them guessing and off balance.
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add to that if you pass on 1st down and it's incomplete, on the following second down you run Sampson between the guards. We've done that all season. If we have an incomplete pass on first down we can catch an opponent by surprise passing on second down, it will be wide open based on our tendencies.
 
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#32
#32
OSU will be our most hostile environment this year including uga so if we start slow it will be false start city
 
#34
#34
sami said:
........ starting strong. Given what has gone down with the OSU fan base bailing on Day and the potential fragility of their confidence, nothing would be better than jumping out of the gate with a couple of early scores and possibly turning the crowd against their own team.

Another slow start could be fatal in a game like this against that kind of defense, but a quick score, a turnover or stop and another quick score would be huge. Dominating the line of scrimmage on both sides is paramount, and taking care of the ball. Take the run away and make Howard beat us, and make his life miserable all night. Do these things and it should be a great night.
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I'll be happy if we can score in ALL 4 QUARTERS...
 
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#35
#35
Or defense will decide if we win this or not. If they can contain Ohio, keep the score low, I think our offense can find enough points to win. We have to make them punt the ball and not give up a lot of 1st downs, long drives. No soft coverages
 
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#37
#37
Yes, if we start with a bunch of mistakes (Sampson fumbling on the first drive) we’ll definitely almost surely positively get beat. One thing about a Josh Heupel coached team is that they don’t seem to get too affected by early on mistakes.
 
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#38
#38
We have to have pretty much a perfect game to win. Play clean football by limiting dumb penalties and turnovers, no busted assignments, Nico has to have the best game of his career so far, we need to start fast.

If we don’t give them anything and constantly apply pressure, will they break and start to doubt themselves after that Michigan game? If they do, then victory is ours.
 
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#39
#39
Get out to the lead. Make them one dimensional, then turn the game over to Pearce and Joseph’s , let them eat. Want see jerimiah smith meet Mr boo Carter over the middle
 
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#40
#40
sami said:
........ starting strong. Given what has gone down with the OSU fan base bailing on Day and the potential fragility of their confidence, nothing would be better than jumping out of the gate with a couple of early scores and possibly turning the crowd against their own team.

Another slow start could be fatal in a game like this against that kind of defense, but a quick score, a turnover or stop and another quick score would be huge. Dominating the line of scrimmage on both sides is paramount, and taking care of the ball. Take the run away and make Howard beat us, and make his life miserable all night. Do these things and it should be a great night.
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Winning the turnover battle and running for 300 yards tomorrow night will get Tennessee a win.
 
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#43
#43
sami said:
........ starting strong. Given what has gone down with the OSU fan base bailing on Day and the potential fragility of their confidence, nothing would be better than jumping out of the gate with a couple of early scores and possibly turning the crowd against their own team.

Another slow start could be fatal in a game like this against that kind of defense, but a quick score, a turnover or stop and another quick score would be huge. Dominating the line of scrimmage on both sides is paramount, and taking care of the ball. Take the run away and make Howard beat us, and make his life miserable all night. Do these things and it should be a great night.
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I'm going with which team scores the most points
 
#44
#44
87&91ALUM said:
Feels like 20 degrees will definitely take its toll on the passing game. Whoever can run or stop the run, kick field goals, and deal with the weather will win the game. I expect a turnover or two on that cold night. The folks in Columbus are used to this weather. We in Tennessee are not and we are starting a young freshman QB from Hawaii. I understand the bookies having us a 7.5 point loser. Having said that, pay attention to the Maxims, be prepared, fight, fight, fight, and keep your head and eyes up, don't make dumb mistakes like offsides, targeting, etc. Go Vols and beat the Buckeyes!
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What starting QB is from Hawaii?
 
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#46
#46
sami said:
........ starting strong. Given what has gone down with the OSU fan base bailing on Day and the potential fragility of their confidence, nothing would be better than jumping out of the gate with a couple of early scores and possibly turning the crowd against their own team.

Another slow start could be fatal in a game like this against that kind of defense, but a quick score, a turnover or stop and another quick score would be huge. Dominating the line of scrimmage on both sides is paramount, and taking care of the ball. Take the run away and make Howard beat us, and make his life miserable all night. Do these things and it should be a great night.
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💯💯💯💯💯
 
#47
#47
There are so many things that could go wrong for each team in this game.

OSU has probably the most talented offensive skill positions in the nation period no one is close. No 3 starting WR's are even in the conversation. Their RB's are 1a and 1b and are both probably gonna be in the top 5-7 backs taken in the draft. If it starts going right for them it can get ugly.

Sampson>Henderson or Judkins but Judkins/Henderson>any 2 deep in the nation.
Smith/Egbuka/Tate best 1/2/3 punch in the nation at WR probably all 3 have first/second-round talent.

The good thing is their Oline is a hot mess right now and their QB is a Gamemanager on his best day.

Our secondary has been rock solid all year but they have not seen a receiver group like this. Bama's WIlliams and Law was the closest we have seen to this level of a WR group and Law was grotesquely underutilized.

Rb's have we played against a beast RB this year? OSU has 2 that are both almost as good as Sampson. I think the best RBs we have seen this year were Booth with Miss State and Jackson at Arkansas.. and lets been real this has been a super down year for RB's in the SEC. Unless a lot of guys have monster bowl games (or texas plays multiple games) the SEC only produced 2 1000 yard rushers. The SEC usually produces like 4-5 of them.


On the other end. OSU's has beaten up on some scrubs all year. They played 2 legit teams (Oregon and Penn State) and 2 decent teams (Michigan* and Indiana) Michigan gets an asterisk because of rivalry. Indiana I seriously want to believe the hype but they literally played a single-ranked team. Their most impressive wins were Nebraska and Michigan. I feel like ND boat races them and then gets spanked by UGA.

UT's SoS is underrated IMHO....I know we all hate to admit it but Vandy was a good team this year. Miss State and Kentucky would have had a winning record in any conference not the SEC. Purdue, Northwestern and Michigan State were very very bad teams that would have had losing records in any P4 conference..They lost to AZ state by 7 and averaged almost 26 points a game. There are not a lot of bad teams scoring 3-4 TD's a game. The lowest scoring team in the SEC was Kentucky at 20.5 a game against mostly SEC defenses. The Big Ten had 4 teams under 20 points a game including Purdue dropping 16 (15.75). I was really looking hard at it and in the Big 10 they way they are structured you can literally have a bad team in the championship game every year and it mostly works out that way. In the SEC its not like that because there are no easy wins.

All those rants done...This is actually a no lose situation for us. No one really expects us to win. Everyone expects a close game but them winning out. Everyone expects the cold weather to be a problem. That being said. I think our defense has been more reliably challenged this year and can be more counted on to play up to who they are. I cant think of a single Defensive implosion we have had this year. how many games has our defense lost us? We have given up more than 19 points twice this year. Vandy (23) and UGA (31)... we have been held to under 23 points twice Arkansas (19) and UGA (17). if our offense and defense hold up to their average performances we win.

UT is an offense built on the run...and we have an amazing defense.. both of those travel and play well in any environment, especially cold. OSU is built on the outside pass and they tend to run a lot more outside the tackles both things that don't work well in the cold, especially with a game manager QB. I think it comes down to 2 things QB pressure, if we pressure their QB and we keep them off ours.. we win. Their DB's like to get handsy also.

the second thing it comes down to is ACC refs.... do they hate the SEC or Big10 more?
 
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#49
#49
pimo1 said:
On the other end. OSU's has beaten up on some scrubs all year. They played 2 legit teams (Oregon and Penn State) and 2 decent teams (Michigan* and Indiana) Michigan gets an asterisk because of rivalry. Indiana I seriously want to believe the hype but they literally played a single-ranked team. Their most impressive wins were Nebraska and Michigan. I feel like ND boat races them and then gets spanked by UGA.

UT's SoS is underrated IMHO....I know we all hate to admit it but Vandy was a good team this year. Miss State and Kentucky would have had a winning record in any conference not the SEC. Purdue, Northwestern and Michigan State were very very bad teams that would have had losing records in any P4 conference..They lost to AZ state by 7 and averaged almost 26 points a game. There are not a lot of bad teams scoring 3-4 TD's a game. The lowest scoring team in the SEC was Kentucky at 20.5 a game against mostly SEC defenses. The Big Ten had 4 teams under 20 points a game including Purdue dropping 16 (15.75). I was really looking hard at it and in the Big 10 they way they are structured you can literally have a bad team in the championship game every year and it mostly works out that way. In the SEC its not like that because there are no easy wins.
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The most infuriating thing is the national media, and thus the corrupt "committee", making it as if the Big 10 and SEC are equals, the cream of CFB. Thanks to Sankey selling the conference out to go into business with the Big 10 and SEC, we're going to deal with this kind of garbage every year unless the playoff format and selection process is changed. This year it was Alabama, Ole Miss, and USCe, next year it might be us.

Nothing would be more gratifying than to see Indiana, Penn State, and Ohio State out this weekend, leaving the Big 10 with a Pac-12 leftover as their sole representative in this thing. They gifted Penn State, who beat nobody and lost their CCG, with a practically free ride into the final four. Ironically, the other team getting an easy draw is Texas, who also lost to the only good team they played and lost their CCG.
 
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